In a pre-trial ruling, the Federal Circuit Court has declined to rule out evidence that a HR manager might have influenced a company owner's decision to dismiss an electrician due to his past as a "unionist troublemaker".
CFMEU construction and general division Victorian branch secretary John Setka should be charged with blackmail over the alleged secondary boycott of the building materials company Boral, according to counsel assisting the Heydon Royal Commission.
The Fair Work Commission plans to run a "paperless" 2014-15 minimum wage review and to allow users to connect to hearings via Skype, personal computers and mobile devices , as it makes greater use of digital technology in the coming year.
The Abbott Government will use Victoria as the beachhead of its joint police taskforce into "industrial criminality and corruption", which will follow up the work of the Heydon Royal Commission.
One month out from the state election, the Victorian Government has called on the Heydon Royal Commission to use its one-year extension to investigate alleged links between organised crime and building unions, and said consideration should be given to deregistering the CFMEU.
Only 21 applications progressed to a decision, with just one upheld, in the first six months of the Fair Work Commission’s new anti-bullying jurisdiction, according the the tribunal's annual report.
The ACCC is continuing investigations into allegations aired in the Heydon Royal Commission of anti-competitive conduct by the Transport Workers Union and Toll Holdings.
The ACCC is urging stevedoring companies to seek out labour productivity gains in current and upcoming bargaining at their container ports, and has singled out DP World for purportedly failing to update productivity targets from those set by the Howard Government in the late 1990s.
The Palmer United Party has agreed to block the Abbott Government's plan to cap payouts from the Fair Entitlements Guarantee (FEG), according to unions.
In a wide-ranging attack on the Heydon Royal Commission, ACTU assistant secretary Tim Lyons has dubbed it as part of a conservative agenda to restrict "organising, industrial action, right of entry, public campaigning, political action and expenditure, litigation, access to arbitration and the right to be self-governing".
