Economists, labour market researchers, and unions have hit back at claims more deregulation is the key to productivity growth, in submissions to a Senate inquiry.
The FWC has rejected the unfair dismissal claim of a Workpac on-hire trades assistant shunted from a BHP Coal mine while on approved leave, finding it a redundancy regardless of whether the host engaged someone else in the role.
The FWC has cleared the way for a worker to challenge his "unusual" temporary sacking, confirming an administrative error that unintentionally ousts an employee can still amount to a "dismissal at law".
The FWC has refused to grant BHP a sweeping order enabling it to transfer its in-house labour-hire workers to its vast array of Pilbara iron ore mines.
A right-wing think tank has told a Senate inquiry that productivity is an increasingly unreliable measure and other statistics provide a better gauge of the economy's health.
A fair work commissioner has extended time for a worker who drove 170km to hand-deliver his unfair dismissal claim, saying "unfortunate" is too gentle a word for delays that left the original languishing in the tribunal's shared mailbox at Hobart's Commonwealth Courts building.
In submissions to the NES review, unions are pushing for the Albanese Government to add 10 days paid reproductive leave to the standards, with the backing of a Labor senator, while the Centre for Future Work is advocating for an additional 10 days paid carers leave.
In what stands as an object lesson in how not to handle performance reviews, the FWC has highlighted the role of "managerial cowardice" and a passive HR department while reinstating a senior academic who received an "exceeds expectations" score shortly before three colleagues formally complained about her conduct.
A former Tech One manager who rejected a "genuinely commercially-based" $2.2 million settlement of his "objectively untenable" $55 million general protections claim is now facing what is likely to be a seven-figure costs order, after a Federal Court ruling.
The FWC's longest-serving member has provided a detailed exposition of the tribunal's approach to suppression orders, reinforcing that it is not merely about "public understanding" of her reasons for finding that an employer did not force an experienced HR manager to resign after less than five months in the job.
