The CPSU is pushing the Albanese Government to bring forward to the start of next year its promised return to centralised bargaining for common terms and conditions in the Australian Public Sector.
A court has told the RTBU it will have to wait until next year to learn whether it might be exposed to damages after Sydney Trains workers bargaining for a new deal gave customers "free rides" as part of industrial action over a six-week period.
In what looms as a showdown over BHP's in-house labour hire operation, the miner's Queensland coal workforce has overwhelmingly voted to take industrial action in pursuit of a new deal built around job security.
RAFFWU says that despite initially challenging the approval of an independent bookseller's agreement, it will be celebrating the result for members set to benefit from a "far superior" wage structure and some of the strongest conditions in retail.
A major plastics manufacturer has this morning applied for the FWC to halt protected action at a plant in Melbourne, where the AWU says the only current action is the employer's lockout of its members.
Influential CFMMEU leader John Setka has flagged taking a "reasonable" approach to the next major bargaining round after the expected abolition of the ABCC, expressing hope that any significant industrial action can be avoided as members seek to keep pace with inflation.
Sydney Trains' request for extra notice of RTBU plans to turn off Opal readers and gates so it could safely do so itself has been rejected by the FWC, a senior member observing that on the employer's own evidence it would only make any potential disruption worse.
A prominent IR academic has told today's jobs summit that the optimism that attended the Fair Work Act's introduction in 2009 was "misplaced", with workers in the years since unable to effectively exercise power when bargaining.
Unions are accusing Apple of trying to ram through a deal that could have employees working up to 60 hours a week without overtime, with the ASU and the SDA calling for more time to consult and RAFFWU seeking 5% a year and to claw back alleged underpayments.
