The Federal Circuit Court has ruled a union does not need to name individual affected employees nor demonstrate they are members to seek penalties against an employer for allegedly threatening adverse action against workers who exercise a workplace right.
Unions have failed to convince an FWC full bench that retailer Aldi should have made a greenfields agreement for its new distribution centre and stores in Regency Park, South Australia, rather than the single agreement voted up by 15 existing employees who had expressed an interest in transferring.
The Opposition has given notice that it will introduce a Private Member's Bill that would trigger a crackdown on underpayments, sham contracting and exploitation of temporary visa workers.
Just 1% of national system employers received formal requests for flexible working arrangements over the past three years and 40% received informal requests, but they only flatly rejected about 1% of the total, according to a report prepared by FWC general manager Bernadette O'Neill.
The summary dismissal of a worker who returned a positive drug result lacked procedural fairness but this was mitigated by the employer's need to ensure a safe workplace, the FWC has ruled.
Pharmacists in two states have held a protected one-hour strike over stalled enterprise bargaining in what is believed to be the first stopwork by the profession in Australia.
The ASU, the union with the biggest membership at Qantas, says the airline faces a "hard sell" to win approval for a 18-month pay freeze after it reported a bumper first half profit of almost $1 billion.
The AWU has accused the construction watchdog of seeking to "terrorise" construction workers and their families by serving prosecution notices on 52 workers over the weekend after a year-long investigation.
The Federal Circuit Court has found a recruitment and labour hire company, its director and HR manager knowingly falsified employment records and made unlawful deductions from the wages of cleaners working in Melbourne's Federation Square and Crown Casino.
