In a crucial test case to build on the Closing Loopholes Act's bolstered rights for union delegates, the meat union is seeking to establish that its shop stewards are entitled to address inductions, post on company noticeboards and conduct member meetings in lunch rooms at a massive Teys abattoir near Brisbane.
The AWU has withdrawn its majority support application for Rio Tinto's Paraburdoo iron ore mines, after the company revealed it had 200 more workers than understood by the union, leaving it without a majority.
Union industrial officers are increasingly being supplanted by external IR lawyers, with the phenomenon most pronounced in "organising" unions, according to the principal of a boutique union-clientele law firm.
CFMEU construction division leader Zach Smith has hit back at "bullshit" claims that a planned restructure to centralise campaigning, communications and training functions will undemocratically hand control to the national office and reduce members' influence.
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.
Ahead of the May 3 election, the ETU has today launched anti-nuclear-power television, radio and social media commercials that target 12 largely marginal seats, including that of Opposition Leader Peter Dutton.
Rail unions are urgently seeking renewed authorisation for festive season protected action at Sydney Trains and NSW Trains, after the Federal Court last night acceded to the employers' bid to temporarily declare unlawful bans to take effect this morning.
A FWC full bench comprising the tribunal's three most senior members has issued a same-job, same-pay order sought by an individual on-hire mineworker placed at South32's Cannington silver, lead and zinc mine in Queensland who claimed it would lift his pay and that of hundreds of co-workers by 60%.
Qantas has agreed to top-up the pay of freight workers at subsidiary Australian Air Express by almost $7000 a year to achieve parity with their directly-engaged colleagues after the ASU raised the prospect of lodging a same-job same-pay claim.
A Melbourne rally in support of the CFMEU's construction division heard today that "three or four" legal challenges at federal and state level are expected against laws putting its branches into administration, as a part of a multi-year campaign.
