Workplace Relations Minister Peter Reith has released plans to overcome the restrictions imposed on outsourcing by a string of recent Federal Court decisions on transmission of business.
A senior member of the IRC had directed a broadside at the Federal Government over under-resourcing of the Commission, saying the Government believed the body should "wither on the vine".
Employers who push for non-union agreements and AWAs against the wishes of their employees could be contravening the WR Act's objectives of promoting freedom of association and fair and effective agreement-making, following an important IRC decision.
In the first such hardline move by an employer involved in Campaign 2000, Brownbuilt has locked out its 60 production employees at its Oakleigh South factory in Melbourne for six months.
Queensland's 60,000 health workers should know mid-week the fate of the enterprise agreement struck between their unions and the State's health department, with the ballot on the deal closing today.
BHP coal workers in the Illawarra district of NSW have walked off the job for 72 hours and about 650 Queensland miners will do the same from tomorrow night - their second round of industrial action within a month in pursuit of a set of common claims.
The FSU is this morning seeking an interlocutory injunction from the Federal Court to stop the Commonwealth Bank offering AWAs, while the union has also announced its shareholder campaign in the lead-up to the bank's October 26 AGM.
The Geraldton Port Authority has engaged in a successful strategy to ensure that it isn't forced to offer MUA members overtime with other stevedores in the port, after the Federal Court declined to amend orders it made earlier this year to protect the union members.
The metal unions' Campaign 2001 will pursue a portable leave and severance entitlements scheme for all manufacturing employers and seek a new training levy from labour hire companies.
