Rugby League Players Association wins registration as a union; Pollies' super comes back to the field; Termination and Cole legislation reaches Senate; OECD visiting Australia for mature workers' study; Halfpenny remembered in Senate; AIRC refuses security deal; Tasmania's Watling yet to be replaced; and AWU magazine delayed.
Australia's longest IR battle continues in the Federal Court next week, with Rio Tinto seeking to overturn an AIRC order that it give preference of employment to 16 sacked Blair Athol coal miners at its nearby Hail Creek mine.
In an embarrassment for the Howard Government, a leaked interdepartmental committee report on work and family for the Prime Minister canvasses giving mothers the right to return to work part-time after giving birth and redesigning the Baby Bonus to "mimic" a 14-week paid maternity leave scheme and reduce inequities in the current system.
Employers have given qualified support to the deal between the Australian Democrats and the Federal Government that should allow passage of the Government's transmission of business bill.
In a major development in shipping, CSL and two of the maritime unions have struck deals for the company's new vessel that provide training for a guaranteed Australian crew and deliver productivity improvements that CSL says will help cement its role in Australia and allow it to seriously look at expanding its business.
NUW secretary Greg Sword has resigned from his job after 19 years, in a move that could see a realignment of forces within both the union and the Victorian ALP.
The ANF will appeal the AIRC's refusal to certify an agreement for a Victorian aged care hostel, after the AIRC found the hostel had withdrawn from the agreement before employees approved it.
The NSW Administrative Decisions Tribunal has dismissed an appeal by a WorkCover Authority senior manager with two small children who claimed indirect discrimination when her office was moved from the Sydney CBD to the Central Coast.
