Of the 4941 unfair dismissal claims settled in conciliation during the seven months from July 1 last year, 3691 involved a payment, according to new statistics from the Fair Work Commission.
Workplace Relations Minister Bill Shorten said today that the FWC is as important a national institution as the Reserve Bank, as he launched the tribunal's first Future Directions progress report, which says 14 of 25 initiatives have been implemented since it began in October last year.
The Fair Work Commission has refused to interfere with Carlton and United Breweries' bid to reduce longstanding staffing levels, finding United Voice unreasonably withheld consent for the proposed changes.
A tribunal has imposed a $100,000 fine on the principal of a Victorian law firm for sexually harassing then sacking a law graduate on a professional placement program, who it found was an employee.
A former long-serving member of the national IR tribunal has drawn lessons from recent case law involving the intersection of employees' out-of-hours conduct and their working lives, saying they provide "real-life examples of what not to do in the question of the clash between work and private life".
Federal Labor senators have recommended a raft of changes to the use of enterprise migration agreements but stopped short of supporting a Greens bill that would have committed further restrictions to law.
ACTU president Ged Kearney has called for an acknowledgement that greater employment insecurity has forced workers to bear more risk by forging a new "social compact" that limits casual engagement, provides portable entitlements to "smooth out" periods of unemployment and reverses "de-skilling".
The Federal Government will insert a new modern award objective into the Fair Work Act to protect penalty rates, Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced today.
Victoria has a new IR minister, with newly installed Victorian Premier Denis Napthine today demoting Richard Dalla-Riva from cabinet to the backbench as part of a sweeping reshuffle.
