The ROC has updated its Federal Court claims against the TWU after the union found a back-up of its Queensland membership database it said was lost when the outgoing state secretary made all the branch's employees redundant in 2010, but the watchdog says it lacks vital information about who could vote.
The ACTU is preparing to train affiliates to comply with the more stringent governance requirements under the Turnbull Government's rules for registered organisations, as the new regulator develops plans to increase awareness of protections for reprisals against whistleblowers - which extend to imprisonment.
The National Farmers' Federation will argue the FWO has misconstrued the horticulture award's piecework provisions in a Federal Court case it believes has the potential to remove much of the incentive to work across the entire sector.
A recruitment system tailored to retain "members for life" regardless of changing jobs or circumstances will help plug the union movement's "leaky bucket", ACTU secretary Sally McManus told today's NexGen2017 conference.
A Senate inquiry has recommended an employer who gives a union official a $20 bottle of wine for speaking at a conference be exempted from sanctions in the corrupting benefits legislation that is before the House of Representatives today.
The Federal Court has today ordered former TWU WA branch secretaries Jim McGiveron and Rick Burton to pay more than $65,000 in penalties, mostly for their roles in purchasing two "luxury utes" for their personal use and arranging a redundancy payment of almost $400,000 to McGiveron.
The new standalone regulator for registered organisations will start operating on Monday, May 1, with its new powers taking effect by the following day.
The timetable for having the Registered Organisations Commission up and running appears to have slipped, with a new target adopted for it to be in place by the end of June.
Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has this afternoon introduced legislation that outlaws payments of "corrupting benefits" to unions and imposes penalties on those who provide or receive such payments.
