The ACTU will on Sunday launch the first in a series of new television advertisements as part of its strategy to head off what it sees as an aggressive push by employers on key areas of policy detail still to be finalised in the Rudd Government's substantive IR legislation.
Minimum salary levels for workers on 457 visas - both new entrants and those already in the workforce - will increase by 3.8% from August, while legislation providing for penalties against employers who breach their visa obligations will be introduced into Parliament later this year, the Federal Government announced today.
The Rudd Government has appointed recently retired Federal Court judge, Murray Wilcox QC, to investigate and report on the role and scope of the specialist division of Fair Work Australia that will replace the ABCC.
A Federal Court judge has upheld the imposition of the maximum $33,000 penalty on a company that deliberately denied a new mother her right to return to work after maternity leave.
Qantas is still refusing to break from its wages cap of 3% a year despite an ACTU-coordinated meeting of aviation unions yesterday calling on it to do so, with the airline saying it was "hardly the time" to change what had worked well for all parties.
Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick is pushing for the Rudd Government to introduce paid maternity leave in two stages - 14 weeks initially, before moving to 48 weeks. Her proposal also provides a further six weeks paid leave for supporting parents.
Store workers at DHL Exel Supply Chain's Matraville (NSW) site are stuck on an unlawfully-made enterprise agreement, after their employer secretly negotiated a deal with the NUW that locked out their longstanding representatives, the TWU.
The AiG has recommended the introduction of 12 to 14 weeks of publicly-funded paid maternity leave and rejected suggestions that employers should contribute, in oral evidence to the Productivity Commission's paid parental leave inquiry today.
The Rudd Government has confirmed that it is looking closely at New Zealand's trial of a temporary unskilled labour scheme, while former AMWU national secretary and now NSW Senator-elect Doug Cameron has warned that the rise of far-Right forces, exploitation of overseas workers, and undermining of local wages and conditions were all potential consequences of big rises in unskilled immigration.
The President of the NSW IRC, Justice Roger Boland, has rejected as unconvincing arguments in favour of centralising IR in Canberra, and said it was a pity the Rudd Government didn't have greater regard for the NSW system in developing "Forward with Fairness".
