The Fair Work Commission, in a decision published today, says it suspended the MUA's protected industrial action at Patrick container terminals to allow further private negotiations to be assisted by presidential member Anna Booth.
Stevedore Patrick will tomorrow ask the FWC to impose a cooling-off period to stop MUA members taking further industrial action at its container ports.
An FWC presidential member has expressed "wonder" at having to reject an agreement for a major labour hire company that turned the simple process of providing employees with a bargaining representation notice into a "debacle".
The FWC has ruled that a company's enterprise agreement obliges it provide "meaningful work" to redeployees and operates as an exception to the general rule that there is no common law right to be provided with work.
As Parliament prepares to rise for the year, the Turnbull Government has introduced legislation containing the provisions removed from the Fair Work Act amending legislation that came into effect last week.
The AWU and Cleanevent are awaiting a Federal Court ruling on their legal tussle over the modern award to cover cleaners at the Spotless group subsidiary.
Stevedore DP World has acknowledged its "clerical error" is to blame for the FWC's rejection of proposed enterprise agreements for its Melbourne and Brisbane container terminals, after its ballot declarations wrongly stated that fewer than 10% and 2% of workers respectively supported the deals.
Changes to greenfields agreements bargaining, protected action ballots and unpaid parental leave have come into effect today, after the Federal Government's Fair Work Amendment Bill received Royal Assent yesterday.
The FWC has for the second time approved an agreement covering the main Sydney Harbour ferry service workforce after dismissing the motivation for a belated scope order bid for masters and engineers as "little more than petty elitism rather than any genuine unfairness".
The new enterprise agreement between Hutchison Ports and the MUA provides for greater use of casual labour and for negotiations on longer working hours as shipping container volumes rise.
