Workplace Relations Minister Bill Shorten has announced today that senior DEEWR official Natalie James will be the new Fair Work Ombudsman, FWC Deputy President Val Gostencnik will be the new head of the Fair Work Building Inspectorate and that he will appoint DEEWR deputy secretary of workplace relations, John Kovacic, to the Fair Work Commission.
The Fair Work Commission has rejected an application to terminate an agreement for traffic management workers, ruling it was against the public interest because it would create confusion over their modern award coverage.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd says the Fair Work Act's balance is "about right", but has put greenfields agreements back on the agenda in his address to the National Press Club in Canberra this afternoon.
The Fair Work Commission has been asked to rule on whether Melbourne's Metropolitan Fire and Emergency Services Board was obliged to consult its workforce and the firefighters union before issuing a directive limiting non-business internet use to one hour per day.
The FWC has taken into account the extreme offensiveness in Chinese culture of an insult conveyed in Mandarin by one Chinese-speaking employee to another, in ruling a mining company was justified in sacking the perpetrator.
A youth detention centre facilities manager who was sacked for divulging confidential information to Melbourne radio station 3AW's Rumour File segment has won compensation after the Fair Work Commission found the Victorian government had not followed the misconduct clause in the state public service enterprise agreement.
The FWC has issued a majority support determination, after rejecting an employer's argument that numbers fell short when an "influential" unofficial workplace delegate changed his mind about pursuing the matter after an "eleventh hour" intervention by a member of its HR team on the eve of the tribunal's hearing.
A long-serving firefighter has successfully challenged a NSW IRC member's ruling that his dismissal for violently shoving a colleague against a kitchen cupboard was not unfair, after a full bench found that his mental illness had not been taken into account.
A FWC full bench has refused Bechtel permission to appeal against a finding that the MUA was entitled to enter its $20 billion Curtis Island LNG projects for discussions with excavator operators, ruling it would be futile to decide the matter because the company no longer employed workers in those roles.
IR consultant Grace Collier has told the HR Nicholls Society that most employers cannot bargain competently, and would be better off with minimalist enterprise deals that allow for pay to be negotiated individually, or no agreement at all.
