An FWC member gave due recognition to the reduction of employees' bargaining power that would flow from him acceding to a DP World bid to extend notice for CFMMEU industrial action from three to five days, according to reasons issued by a full Federal Court today.
The TWU will today raise the spectre of nationwide airport and road freight strikes as it pursues "sector-wide rates" for 38,000 workers covered by 200 expiring enterprise agreements.
The CFMMEU's maritime division and the NRMA-owned operator of Sydney's Manly Fast Ferry service are expected to face off in the FWC this afternoon over planned stoppages that could start tomorrow, after talks this morning failed to resolve a bargaining impasse.
Protected industrial action will start at DP World's four container terminals on Friday in the form of work bans, followed by rolling stoppages in individual ports from next week.
An FWC full bench has upheld a decision requiring the CFMMEU to give DP World extra notice of industrial action at container terminals in Brisbane, Fremantle, Sydney and Melbourne, despite the union's protestations that it placed too much emphasis on the effect upon third parties.
The legal definition of employee should be broadened to cover anyone who agrees to supply their labour, according to a new book on addressing Australia's wage stagnation.
The FWC has ordered Broadspectrum's WA court security and transport officers to suspend protected action, finding that banning overtime and ditching uniforms posed a risk to the public, court and hospital staff and the prisoners themselves.
The AMWU says a decision by the RBA's money printing arm, Note Printing Australia, to lock out workers in response to a planned one-hour stopwork leaves members free to employ an element of surprise in future actions in support of a new deal.
An order requiring the NTEU to give a university more than the statutory three days' notice of protected industrial action has been quashed by an FWC full bench that found a tribunal member wrongly presupposed that any such action would be suspended by the Commission if it interfered with student exams or graduation.
The IEU is recommending NSW and ACT Catholic school teachers and support workers vote "yes" to a revised deal breaking an extended deadlock over guaranteed access to FWC arbitration, while employers have committed to making a second back-payment to the start of the year.
