Boosted delegates' rights will make workplaces more cooperative, potentially increasing productivity and workers' openness to new technologies such as artificial intelligence, according to a report that also warns unions not to fall into a trap with their paid training leave win.
The AWU has abandoned a long history of going it alone in Queensland, re-affiliating with the State's peak union body, while the Mining and Energy Union has also returned to the fold after a shorter absence.
Three unions representing workers at Wilmar Sugar's operations in north Queensland are seeking an urgent stay on FWC orders banning protected industrial action for six weeks.
The CFMEU will seek to overturn a recent legal representation ruling, maintaining the FWC got it wrong when it allowed a construction company to have both a barrister and a paid agent appear on its behalf.
Victoria Police rejected a crime scene officer's request for a flexible work arrangement on reasonable business grounds, the FWC has held, while urging the parties to embrace a "better than nothing" compromise.
More than 300 employees of labour provider Workpac placed at Batchfire's Callide thermal coal mine near Biloela are set to receive increases in November of up to $20,000 a year, according to the MEU, after a FWC full bench made its first same-job, same-pay ruling today.
The FWC has approved an Aldi deal with undertakings that expunge labour hire clauses designed, according to the SDA, to circumvent "same-job, same-pay" laws.
Parties involved in the FWC's consideration of gender undervaluation in five care and community sector awards will have a chance to agree on a methodology for assessing work value at a conference next Monday.
A worker's "unfortunate" comment to the FWC that "it is nearly impossible to injure someone when driving a forklift at 8km/h", demonstrating his "unsatisfactory understanding of workplace safety", has clinched a ruling that upheld his sacking, after he admitted to smoking marijuana the night before a collision.
