MUA national secretary John Coombs announced today that he would retire early next month after an eight-year reign that included leading the union through the tumultuous 1998 waterfront dispute.
The low post-GST CPI growth has reduced the likelihood of a wages breakout, while labour productivity in the past year has declined, according to the Reserve Bank.
Opposition Leader Kim Beazley has accused both the Prime Minister, John Howard, and the Workplace Relations Minister, Peter Reith, of being "mired in the industrial relations debate of past times".
The FSU says the 3% interim increase the CBA will pay its 25,000 award employees from the end of the month is a "downpayment" on a decent pay increase yet to be negotiated.
Victorian public servants have overwhelmingly endorsed a deal struck between the State Government and the CPSU that re-establishes core service-wide entitlements and puts an end to the Kennett Government's individual contracts regime.
The transmission of business provisions in the Workplace Relations Act should only apply to awards and not to certified agreements or AWAs, according to key employer organisation, the AiG.
Westpac IT employees who refuse to move to an outsourced provider will be entitled to 50% of their redundancy payment if they can't be redeployed within the bank, after the IRC partially rejected Westpac's bid for exemption from its redundancy obligations.
