The ACTU and the Victorian Government in supplementary submissions to the FWC's annual wage review have maintained their requests for real wage increases, while the AiG has fallen into line with ACCI and backed a freeze.
Unions are still in the dark about which NSW public servants would qualify for a $1000 frontline worker 'bonus' in lieu of a pay rise, while a health union has asked the State Treasurer to ditch a 2.5% wages cap before it puts the offer to members.
Unions objecting to a joint employer group bid for coronavirus-driven variations to building awards that would allow hours to be cut to zero have today also questioned its validity, given two of the peak bodies are not registered organisations.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's plan for a dialogue with unions and employers over changes to workplace laws has sparked a scramble among stakeholders to get a seat at the table.
The NTEU has declared that a proposed framework to secure higher education jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic is "dead" as a national agreement but might still be voted up at individual universities.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's headland speech on a new approach to IR change extended an olive branch to unions by dropping the "ensuring integrity' legislation, but also raised the prospect of further measures to crack down on unlawful behaviour on construction sites.
The ACTU will head into the Morrison Government's JobMaker policy discussions with the aim of reducing insecure employment and extending paid pandemic leave.
Industrial Relations Minister Christian Porter will chair five working groups with the aim of producing a "practical reform" of the IR system to help grow jobs as the economy emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic.
Thirteen major law firms have dropped their application for temporary changes to the Legal Services Award in response to the coronavirus, a month after the ASU demanded they prove the changes were necessary.
