The Abbott Government has urged the Fair Work Commission to take a "cautious approach" in this year's minimum wage review due to below-trend GDP growth and a slower than expected recovery in non-mining sectors, while the ACTU says the small business measures in the Budget "dramatically improve the affordability" of pay rises in the award-reliant sector.
The Abbott Government has quietly dropped re-establishing the Australian Building and Construction Commission and creating the Registered Organisations Commission as "major priorities" in its 2015-16 Budget.
A leading silk has told a gathering of major employers that the federal government should adopt the Harper competition review's recommendation to outlaw agreement clauses that limit employers' use of contractors and labour hire employees.
The Victorian Government has revealed that its employee expenses will grow by just over 7% this financial year, ahead of bargaining for major replacement agreements with public sector workers over the next year.
Former NSW ETU leader Bernie Rordan says he was warned that litigation by a fellow union secretary could prevent his appointment to the Fair Work Commission in 2012.
The Department of Employment has crunched the numbers on Australia's 122 modern awards, finding that just half provide for weekend penalty loadings, and 26 rule them out.
The Senate committee inquiring into the federal government's bargaining bill has handed down a report free of any recommendations to improve it, with Coalition senators wanting it passed without amendment and Labor and the Greens calling for its rejection.
The Abbott Government has appointed to the High Court the Federal Court judge Michelle Gordon, who last month was part of a full bench that struck down the Coalition's attempt to exclude foreign workers on offshore resources projects from Australian labour standards.
The FWC has issued a new, unconditional entry permit to the CFMEU construction and general division's Queensland leader, rejecting the building watchdog's argument that it should be withheld because of union conduct that has attracted more than $900,000 in fines during his eight years as "ringmaster".
