The NSW IRC last year received 36% more applications than in 2023, while cases finalised dropped by 16%, according to its latest annual report, which takes in the first six months of its renewed powers.
NSW IR Minister Sophie Cotsis says a Bill providing for the CFMEU State branch's mining and energy division and its manufacturing division to disamalgamate will guard against threats or "adverse conduct", while avoiding overlapping eligibility rules for at least a decade.
The Minns Government has passed major reforms that establish anti-bullying and s-xual harassment jurisdictions in the IRC and allow workers to seek preventative orders and up to $100,000 in damages, while also significantly lifting the small claims cap.
The NSW Government has scrapped contentious proposals in a workers compensation bill to be introduced today requiring employees to secure an IRC ruling before claiming for harassment-related psychological injuries, while adding "excessive work demands" as a new compensable cause.
The nurses union says NSW health workers and women will be most disadvantaged by proposed workers compensation changes making it "almost impossible" to claim for psychological injuries, while the NSW Bar Association is urging parliamentarians to reject it and demand a "substantive review".
A government agency has been scolded for failing to pay travel allowances after admitting that it slipped its notice that the claims had been processed manually by two firefighters, one of whom retired while the other went on extended leave.
A tribunal has pilloried a government department's efforts to fill a vacancy after observing that a senior nurse encouraged to apply had the role plucked away from her following the "catastrophic collision" of three internal processes.
Queensland Health has been ordered to backpay a nurse for an unpaid suspension imposed while investigating a complaint that he "grabbed" a patient's t-sticles in an attempt to revive them after they fainted while showering, a tribunal finding it failed to inform him that it took into account previous allegations of inappropriate behaviour.
The NSW IRC has affirmed its ability to dictate the terms of a corrective Facebook post it forced the HSU to publish and has dismissed a claim that in heading off paramedics' industrial action, a senior tribunal member approached it on the basis that State IR laws don't "tolerate" it during conciliation.
