INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS – AUSTRALIA

ABC staff cancel strike after winning pay rise, but some rankled by disrespect

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Original article by Zoe Samios
The Age – Page: Online : 23-Mar-23

The Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance’s members at the ABC will not proceed with industrial action on Wednesday after the union reached an in-principle agreement with the public broadcaster for a new workplace deal. Cassie Derrick from the MEAA has praised the direct intervention of ABC MD David Anderson, and she emphasises that the dispute had not just been about pay. ABC employees will receive a pay rise of 11 per cent over three years, and a one-off bonus of $1,500. The ABC has also agreed to undertake an audit of the gender and cultural diversity pay gap, and implement a new framework for career progression. However, members of the Community & Public Sector Union at the ABC still intend to go on strike for two hours.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, MEDIA, ENTERTAINMENT AND ARTS ALLIANCE, COMMUNITY AND PUBLIC SECTOR UNION

NAB faces test case over unpaid overtime

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Original article by David Marin-Guzman
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 4 : 8-Mar-23

The issue of ‘reasonable additional hours’ for white-collar workers will come under scrutiny in a test case launched by the Finance Sector Union. The case centres on four National Australia Bank managers who allege that they were required to work unreasonable unpaid hours over several years. The FSU’s national secretary Julia Angrisano says the NAB managers are nominally employed to work 38 hours a week, but their actual hours can range between 10 and 16 hours per day, every day of the week. Angrisano adds that the FSU will seek compensation for all of NAB’s managers if it wins the test case, while it would also pursue action against the nation’s other major banks.

CORPORATES
NATIONAL AUSTRALIA BANK LIMITED – ASX NAB, FINANCE SECTOR UNION

ABC staff have called off Tuesday’s planned strike to consider a new pay offer

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Original article by Sophie Elsworth
The Australian – Page: Online : 7-Mar-23

ABC employees will not proceed with industrial action on Tuesday after the public broadcaster offered a sweetened pay deal. The ABC has offered a pay rise of 11.5 per cent over three years, backdated to the start of October 2022, and a sign-on bonus of $1,500. ABC employees have been pushing for annual pay rises of six per cent for three years, and negotiations with the broadcaster will continue. The 40-minute strike by ABC journalists had been timed to coincide with the latest interest rate announcement from the Reserve Bank.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION

ABC boss seeks peace deal as strike looms

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Original article by James Madden, Sophie Elsworth
The Australian – Page: 19 : 6-Mar-23

ABC MD David Anderson will meet with representatives of the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance on Monday, in a bid to avert industrial action over a new pay deal. The MEAA and the public broadcaster’s journalists have rejected an offer of a pay rise of 10.5 per cent over three years and are pushing for an annual increase of six per cent for three years. The proposed 40-minute strike on Tuesday has been timed to coincide with the Reserve Bank’s interest rate announcement. Longer strikes have been flagged in coming weeks if the ABC does not return to the bargaining table.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, MEDIA, ENTERTAINMENT AND ARTS ALLIANCE, RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA

Multi-employer wage fight test

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Original article by Ewin Hannan
The Australian – Page: 6 : 15-Feb-23

The Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union will seek to reinstate all clauses that were banned in workplace agreements under the Coalition’s building industry code of conduct. A proposed multi-employer agreement for heating, ventilation and airconditioning manufacturers may become a test case for Labor’s workforce reforms, which scrapped the building code. Actus Workplace Lawyers principal Stephen Smith notes that some airconditioning companies have entered into pattern agreements with the AMWU in recent years; he says hundreds of companies could be forced to adopt the same wages and conditions if the union seeks to vary the agreement to include other employers.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN MANUFACTURING WORKERS’ UNION, ACTUS WORKPLACE LAWYERS

Woodside challenges bargaining orders for offshore gas

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Original article by David Marin-Guzman
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 2 : 8-Feb-23

Woodside Energy has appealed the Fair Work Commission’s ruling that it must hold collective bargaining negotiations with unions that represent workers at its offshore gas platforms in Western Australia. The FWC had ruled that the Offshore Alliance had secured the majority support of 200 production workers for a collective agreement. However, Woodside contends that supervisors should not have been included in the bargaining order, and that doing so could compromise their ability to perform their duties. Woodside has had a policy of "direct engagement" with employees at its North West Shelf platforms, where it has used individual contracts rather than enterprise agreements since 1994.

CORPORATES
WOODSIDE ENERGY GROUP LIMITED – ASX WDS, AUSTRALIA. FAIR WORK COMMISSION, OFFSHORE ALLIANCE

Teal MP Ryan sued over sacking for unreasonable hours

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Original article by Ronald Mizen, Michael Read
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 3 : 1-Feb-23

The enterprise agreement for staff of federal MPs provides for them to receive an allowance for when they are required to work "reasonable additional hours" over and above the ordinary hours of duty. The court application filed by Sally Rugg shows that the former chief of staff to independent MP Monique Ryan alleges that she was sacked for refusing to work "unreasonable" hours. Rugg will contend that her dismissal constitutes a breach of the Fair Work Act because it was in response to her exercising a workplace right. She is seeking an injunction to prevent her termination from taking effect until the dispute is resolved, as well as compensation from Ryan and the federal government. The enterprise agreement does not define what constitutes "reasonable hours".

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Dozens more cases expose CFMEU to maximum fines

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Original article by David Marin-Guzman
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 5 : 19-Jan-23

Court records show that the Fair Work Ombudsman is currently handling 35 open cases involving the Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining & Energy Union. This includes five appeals launched by the CFMEU and one appeal that was instigated by the defunct Australian Building & Construction Commission. The ABCC’s case load was transferred to the FWO after the building industry watchdog was abolished in late 2022. Steven Amendola of law firm Kingston Reid says the CFMEU could potentially face total fines in excess of $5m if judges impose maximum or near-maximum penalties in each case.

CORPORATES
CONSTRUCTION, FORESTRY, MARITIME, MINING AND ENERGY UNION OF AUSTRALIA, AUSTRALIA. FAIR WORK OMBUDSMAN, AUSTRALIAN BUILDING AND CONSTRUCTION COMMISSION, KINGSTON REID

Unions push for a wage deal levy for non-members

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Original article by Angus Thompson
The Age – Page: Online : 11-Jan-23

Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics shows that union membership fell to a record low of just 12.5 per cent in 2022. Several unions have called for a long-standing ban on imposing bargaining fees on non-members to be overturned. The Health Services Union’s national president Gerard Hayes and Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union secretary Steve Murphy are amongst those who contend that workers who benefit from union-negotiated enterprise agreements but are not members of the union should pay a fee. Meanwhile, the ACTU has used its submission to a migration review to call for migrant workers to be inducted by unions and be given the opportunity to join one.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BUREAU OF STATISTICS, HEALTH SERVICES UNION OF AUSTRALIA, AUSTRALIAN MANUFACTURING WORKERS’ UNION, ACTU

Greens to push for right to disconnect in next wave of IR changes

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Original article by Angus Thompson
Brisbane Times – Page: Online : 7-Dec-22

The federal government’s Secure Jobs, Better Pay Bill was recently passed by parliament with the Greens’ support. The government will pursue further industrial relations reforms in 2023, and Greens leader Adam Bandt says his party will push for this to include a legislated "right to disconnect" from work outside of an employee’s official working hours. He notes that many employers now expect their workers to respond to emails and telephone calls at all times. Workers in several European countries already have a right to disconnect. The Greens will also push for casual workers to have greater input into the scheduling of their work hours.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN GREENS