About 3,000 coal mining workers are voting on an agreement between the CFMEU (mining & energy division) and the BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance for the company's central Queensland coal sites that delivers a 5% wage rise for each of its three years, a $3,500 one-off payment, significantly improved super, and a $5,000-a-year increase to the production bonus.
Employers are set to face higher superannuation demands from unions in coming enterprise bargaining rounds, as the ACTU executive meeting today votes on a resolution to seek 12% contributions by 2012.
John Holland says in a submission to the federal government that after a year in the Comcare scheme, the company has improved its safety performance and achieved significant savings. It also seeks to debunk what it says are myths about Comcare - that it only covers low-risk industries and that it has fewer inspectors than state and territory schemes.
Mitsubishi and vehicle unions have agreed to a severance deal for workers at the defunct Tonsley Park factory in Adelaide that sets a new high for the industry.
The ABCC has launched a new legal action against the CFMEU over a Victorian construction project, while Superannuation and Corporate Law Minister Nick Sherry has signalled a Federal Government push to link executive salaries more closely to company outcomes, including through new reporting requirements.
The new Team Jetstar collective agreement for cabin crew will enable the airline to match new entrant Tiger's employment cost base, chief executive Alan Joyce told Workplace Express this morning after parent company Qantas announced a record pre-tax half-year profit of $905 million.
The Rudd Government has today announced the membership of the business advisory groups that will help it to draft its substantive IR legislation and the fair dismissal code.
Pay rates excluding bonuses have continued to grow at 4.2% a year in the December quarter of 2007, a level uncomfortably close to the RBA's 4.5% aggregate wage growth "ceiling", while rates of pay including bonuses have hit a new high.
A major defence contractor has been refused an exemption from racial discrimination laws to meet US security requirements, in a ruling by the Northern Territory Anti-Discrimination Commission.
