BHP has played down the impact of industrial action at its Queensland coal mines, highlighting that the protected action won support from only about 15% of Operations Services production employees in Queensland.
CFMMEU mining and energy division members have this week kicked off protected action in BHP's Queensland coal mines, sparking early sparring over the company's proposed ban on allowing workers back into their accommodation camp while on strike.
The FWC has outlined its "interim" strategy for regulating registered organisations while it awaits the result of a review of functions it inherited as part of the Albanese Government's Secure Jobs legislation.
A CFMMEU organiser has been granted an entry permit despite a lengthy history of convictions for alcohol-related offences, the FWC in part reasoning that because none occurred in workplace settings he met the definition of a fit and proper person.
A CFMMEU organiser ordered to pay $10,000 out of his own pocket for entry breaches has avoided having his permit withdrawn after the FWC found that doing so would be "punitive and nothing more".
The FWC has refused to suspend engineers' industrial action at a Virgin Australia subsidiary while their employer pursues an intractable bargaining declaration, in an early test of the new Secure Jobs provision.
Long-serving MUA national secretary Paddy Crumlin is understood to be well ahead of a rank-and-file challenger in the union's quadrennial elections, which has had problems with misspelt ballot papers and a "whistle-blower complaint" to the FWC's general manager.
