Former AIRC senior deputy president and judge, Paul Munro, has delivered a blistering attack on the Coalition's proposed IR changes, accusing the Prime Minister, John Howard, of carrying out a vendetta against the Commission and the Federal Workplace Relations Minister, Kevin Andrews ("the altar boy") of wielding Howard's "stiletto" - but "don't ask him what it all means".
Employers have outmanoeuvered the ACTU and CFMEU in metalliferous mining by pursuing non-union and individual contract strategies and doing deals with the "more compliant" AWU, according to a review of last year's employer wins and losses by Deakin University academic Bruce Hearn Mackinnon.
The Coalition's planned changes to IR legislation are "laced with a good deal of hatred for the trade union movement", according to ACTU assistant secretary, Richard Marles.
The President of the AIRC, Justice Geoffrey Giudice, yesterday told a conference what supporters of his institution have been saying since federal Workplace Relations Minister, Kevin Andrews, announced his plan to establish the Australian Fair Pay Commission - that the Government had the option to amend the criteria that the AIRC has been obliged to take into account in fixing minimum wages since 1996.
Verbal war breaks out over Victorian construction deal as negotiator claims sign-up of majors imminent; and New WA working hours regime doesn't limit hours.
Reserve Bank Governor Ian Macfarlane has thrown his weight behind further IR change, while new Treasury research says scrapping all IR regulation would boost labour productivity growth by 0.25% a year.
