Employers should pay close attention to their "extended workforce" before being forced to do so by increased regulation and public scrutiny, according to former Fair Work Ombudsman Natalie James.
A large pharmaceutical company is obliged to convert labour hire workers to permanent positions after a year's continuous employment, the FWC ruling that the relevant agreement clause was a permitted matter because it promoted job security.
The FWC has rejected a multi-pronged attempt by four retrenched dockworkers to establish that they were not genuinely redundant, finding their employer's offer to re-engage them as casuals did not detract from its need to reduce its full-time workforce.
The CFMMEU will this week seek to intervene in a class action pursuing leave entitlements for thousands of Workpac's on-hire casual black coal mine workers, at a hearing expected to also deal with the company's bid to block another casual, Robert Rossato, from winning entitlements.
Ahead of a hearing into Workpac's bid to stop casuals winning leave entitlements, Adero Law says more than 600 mineworkers have already joined a new class action against the labour supplier that seeks to claw back up to $84 million for about 7000 on hire casuals.
After providing $150,000 to settle an underpayments claim brought by five fruit pickers last year, labour hire company Agri Labour Australia is facing a new claim from 26 seasonal workers alleging they were short-paid more than $200,000.
The CFMMEU says two pared-back production and maintenance BHP agreements awaiting approval in the FWC would create an "in-house, cut-price labour hire workforce" and a "template for the mining industry to get around Skene".
The RTBU is targeting a labour hire company's training school and its top executives with a backpayment claim for unremunerated "on-the-job" learning, potentially covering hundreds of past and present participants that the union characterises as "employees".
Labour hire company Spinifex Recruiting has again come under fire for its reliance on a "misnamed" temporary employment agreement, with an FWC full bench rejecting its argument that it did not dismiss a casual worker because its client merely exercised its discretion to terminate her assignment.
Class action law firm Adero says it believes labour supplier One Key Workforce wound up owing more than 2000 mineworkers on casual contracts far more than the $38 million sum estimated by administrators, as it prepares to file a claim holding its parent company liable as their "true employer".
