A major law firm says the FWC's first ruling on the merits of a bullying application should calm employers' fears about the new jurisdiction, claiming that the tribunal has adopted "an extremely broad" interpretation of the exemption for reasonable management action.
BHP Billiton has stepped up pressure over a bargaining deadlock involving tug boat crews in Port Hedland, warning it is “actively pursuing” legal options to prevent industrial action.
The need for employers to consider the individual circumstances of employees taking industrial action before they institute disciplinary action has been demonstrated in a FWC finding that a company unfairly dismissed a crane driver who belatedly joined an unlawful stop-work meeting.
The ACTU's bid to remove former senior public servant Tony Cole from this year's annual wage review has failed, after he told the peak body in a consultation hearing this morning that he would not step down because he was not a party to the Audit Commission's recommendation to reduce the minimum wage.
Pacific National was justified in sacking a long-serving train driver who was 120 seconds away from colliding with another train, after failing to see and respond to two signals, the Fair Work Commission has found.
A senior IR lawyer has told the HR Nicholls Society the Fair Work Act should be amended to ban protected industrial action that has serious consequences and to remove entirely the rights of high income earners to strike, in a presentation predicting the decline of the MUA's power and influence.
The ACTU's request for a member of the Fair Work Commission's minimum wage review panel to stand aside is expected to come to a head at a hearing in Melbourne tomorrow.
A finance broking house that issued a Brisbane-based employee five payslips in six years and employed him on a commission-based agreement that it believed did not entitle him to base salary, sick pay, annual leave and superannuation entitlements has been ordered to pay him almost $124,000 in penalties.
Labor and the Greens have combined in the Senate today to defeat the Abbott Government's legislation to establish a Registered Organisations Commission and align penalties for union and employer association officials with corporations law.
Melbourne's fire authority has failed to have FWC member Nick Wilson bar himself from hearing its high-stakes application to terminate its expired enterprise agreements after he ruled that a "fair-minded observer" would not see any difficulties with his involvement in earlier related cases.
