A five-member FWC full bench has confirmed the provisional view it reached in August last year that there is not a strong enough case, with the COVID-19 pandemic relatively well-controlled in Australia, to insert paid pandemic in awards covering paramedics and NDIS, home care and patient transport workers.
Home-based workers will be able to negotiate their preferred hours and breaks under COVID-19-related award flexibilities likely to be approved by the FWC this week.
The FWC has found "persuasive" the High Court's reliance in Mondelez on ordinary hours to calculate entitlements, dumping a union's attempt to win more annual leave for council waste and recycling workers.
While Virgin workers have voted up five new agreements, pilots' overwhelming rejection of a Virgin Australia deal is the largest VIPA has seen and cabin crew's 70% "no" vote comes despite the FAAA telling members it was the best that could be achieved.
The ASU is challenging the ATO's COVID-19 emergency work-from-home arrangements and its ability to quickly call employees back to the office, accusing it in a Federal Court adverse action case of breaching the terms of its agreement.
The AWU is seeking to delete a decade-old pieceworker provision in the horticulture award that it claims leaves affected workers with no safety net and substandard rates of pay.
The FWC has expressed scepticism in refusing to approve an agreement made with only one employee, rejecting a later claim that the company's director would also be covered.
FWC President Iain Ross has agreed to consider IR Minister Christian Porter's request that he insert loaded rates into awards for "distressed" industries and will convene initial conferences next week.
The FSU is accusing an industry superannuation fund of undermining the union's bargaining role and engaging in delaying tactics to "intimidate employees on a one on one basis", in an application for good faith bargaining orders filed this week.
IR Minister Christian Porter has asked FWC President Iain Ross to consider how to best insert "loaded rates" incorporating penalty rates and other benefits into four awards covering industries "distressed" by the coronavirus pandemic.
