Royal Commissioner Dyson Heydon has rejected union applications for him to stand down from the inquiry on the grounds of apprehended bias, while acknowledging they could still apply to a court to make such a ruling.
The Federal Court has ordered former HSU national secretary Kathy Jackson to repay about $1.4 million to her old union, in an important judgment on the conduct of officers in registered organisations.
The ACTU is seeking to build opposition to cutting weekend penalty rates through a mass door-knock in marginal seats across Australia in mid-September, while employer associations are pushing crossbench senators to back the Government's bill to re-establish the ABCC.
The federal government is planning to end what it claims is "double-dipping" when 20,000 working parents each year receive their full paid parental leave entitlements from both their employer and the public purse, but leading IR academics say the two payments are intended to be complementary.
The Senate committee inquiring into the federal government's bargaining bill has handed down a report free of any recommendations to improve it, with Coalition senators wanting it passed without amendment and Labor and the Greens calling for its rejection.
In a move that the government has dismissed as a political stunt, the ACTU has told Employment Minister Eric Abetz he should suspend his IR legislative agenda for at least a year to enable the Heydon trade union inquiry and the Productivity Commission Fair Work Act review to run their course.
Employees should be completely free to choose their superannuation funds, and they should be run by trustee boards dominated by independent directors, according to the Murray financial system inquiry's report.
The Australian Institute of Employment Rights says the pending Productivity Commission review of the Fair Work laws risks being a narrow, market-oriented exercise if its terms of reference do not embrace international human rights and labour standards, in a discussion paper released today.
