IR Minister Christian Porter has flagged that he is looking to change key awards so that permanent part-time employees can agree to work extra hours at their usual rates of pay as required, leading to less reliance on casual work.
The Ai Group is calling for urgent legislation to enable awards to keep pace with "contemporary work practices", after an FWC full bench rejected a joint bid to boost overtime provisions for lower-level IT professionals while preserving flexibilities.
Federal Parliament is set to pass the Morrison Government's $130 billion JobKeeper wage subsidy tomorrow after changes agreed last night between IR Minister Christian Porter and ACTU secretary Sally McManus.
In a decision vindicating the FWO's resistance to the grouping of multiple contraventions for the purpose of setting penalties, the workplace watchdog has won a fivefold increase in fines imposed on an underpaying company director.
The FWC will no longer be required to conduct four-yearly reviews of modern awards, while being given powers to approve enterprise agreements despite minor procedural or technical errors, under long-delayed legislation passed by the Federal Parliament last night.
Two unions are poised to lodge legal challenges to penalty rate cuts as early as tomorrow after the Fair Work Commission issued determinations on transitional arrangements in the retail and hospitality sectors.
Maverick Federal Nationals MP George Christensen has this morning made good on his vow to introduce a private members' bill to stop Sunday penalty rates from being cut in 11 days' time.
Two important minor parties – the Nick Xenophon Team and Pauline Hanson's One Nation – have reversed their support for cutting penalty rates in the retail and hospitality sectors.
Employment Minister Michaelia Cash has asked the Opposition to back new legislation that would scrap the Fair Work Act's mandatory four-yearly reviews of modern awards.
