A court has elected not to impose a personal payment order against a CFMEU official fined $7500 for organising action that severely disrupted a major construction project, despite finding his actions "nothing short of unconscionable".
The AFP has interviewed staffers from more than one ministerial office in its investigation into the leaking of information on last year's raids on the AWU, a Senate Estimates hearing has been told.
One of Victoria's most senior judges has queried whether the blackmail charges laid against two CFMEU officials over an alleged secondary boycott of Boral are a "little experimental".
Suppressed wage growth and rising inequality pose a threat to both Australia's economy and its political stability, according to former Labor treasurer Wayne Swan, who used a party-sponsored conference on the weekend to confirm that his personal economic settings had been "moved to the left" by the GFC.
RBA Governor Philip Lowe is maintaining his faith that the laws of supply and demand will eventually lead to higher wages, but has conceded that the low growth in pay is a global phenomenon that is troubling central banks and "no-one really knows how long it is going to last".
Uber says legal distinctions between employees and independent contractors are discouraging it from offering training and "other perks and benefits" to drivers, while emphasising the company's intent to work with policymakers to provide "new models of social protection".
A jobs guarantee and universal basic income are among the policies government must embrace if Australia is to avoid a technology-led march towards inferior low-paying jobs, a leading academic has told a Senate inquiry into the future of work.
An Uber driver's failure to convince the FWC that he is an employee is unlikely to deter other challenges according to an academic, while the case raises questions as to whether traditional legal tests can be applied to the gig economy.
The IR portfolio has been demoted in Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's reshuffle this afternoon, with the role given to a new junior minister, Craig Laundy.
Labor's audacious bid to restore penalty rates in the retail and hospitality sectors by piggy-backing one of the Federal Government's own IR bills fell at the first hurdle today, when rebel Nationals MP George Christensen indicated he could not support legislation that failed to protect businesses from back-pay claims.
