A major civil construction company has launched a Federal Court challenge to the rejection by an FWC full bench of an agreement that it found would allow workers to be covered by future deals ahead of its nominal expiry date.
The FWC will set a week of hearings at the end of February to hear a RAFFWU bid to quash Woolworths' nominally-expired 2012 deal before a newly voted-up replacement is approved, with the retailer and the SDA saying they need time to consult the rest of the workforce.
The FWC has further clarified the circumstances in which the signatures of a majority of workers can compel an employer to bargain with a union, finding that inviting employees to add their names to a petition occasionally left in an unlocked car did not reduce its force.
The FWC says RAFFWU's objections to a Woolworths deal it expects to be voted up next week will delay its approval by "many months", as the tribunal orders the retailer to produce wage comparison documents to inform the union's bid to terminate the 2012 agreement.
The AWU and other unions have failed in an attempt to delay the Fair Work Commission's hearing of Esso's application to terminate the enterprise agreement for Bass Strait offshore oil and gas workers.
The ETU says a $40,000 penalty against an employer for failing to consult before engaging labour hire workers on inferior pay and conditions sends a message that pre-Building Code job security clauses in agreements are still enforceable.
An FWC full bench majority has refused to let the SDA amend appeals of two Aldi agreements to challenge the retailer's use of the word "leader" instead of "employer" in notices of representative rights, holding that the union must wait until the outcome of a judicial review on the same issue.
Qube Ports must withdraw final warnings issued to seven Port Kembla workers who refused shift extensions, after the FWC took its bargaining team by "complete surprise" and found the employer misconstrued a common abbreviation in its agreement.
The Full Federal Court has dismissed an employer's attempted challenge to an arbitrated decision by the FWC, finding that an enterprise agreement at Victoria's Yallourn power station and coal mine provided for "final and binding" dispute resolution.
