The CFMMEU construction and general division's pledge overnight of its "full support" for embattled Victorian branch secretary John Setka has been undercut by the resignation today of his deputy, Shaun Reardon, due to "irreconcilable differences" with his boss.
Labor's new shadow IR minister is prominent frontbencher and former SDA organiser Tony Burke, who in his youth won improved pay and conditions for paperboys after threatening to picket a newsagency.
Re-elected Prime Minister Scott Morrison has stressed the importance of law enforcement in adding IR to the responsibilities of Attorney-General Christian Porter in his new ministry announced yesterday.
As a brilliant ACTU advocate, the young Bob Hawke once delivered an "address-in-reply" in the then Conciliation and Arbitration Commission that lasted 12 days.
A mountain-climbing former radiographer who once found a future FWC vice president leading a team of dancing lawyers outside her office has become one of the tribunal's newest senior members.
The composition and role of the Fair Work Commission "must be re-examined" due to Coalition governments appointing 20 consecutive members from an employer background, according to an internal ACTU report.
In a valedictory speech tracing his arrival in Sydney as an "economic refugee" in 1973 to becoming a union leader and Labor shadow minister, Senator Doug Cameron has told the Senate that his belief in socialism drove him to seek a Senate seat and credited his wife with saving him from alcohol addiction.
A representative for IR Minister Kelly O'Dwyer has praised a new FWC presidential appointee for his HR expertise and direct business experience, observing it is "not a common attribute" of Commission members "who tend to operate in the IR system".