At my employer, a local council, we seem to be at a bit of a crossroads regarding unions and membership. The standard union for a council in Victoria is the ASU, which has been representing my council for many decades now. However, due to bad blood over the extremely poor EBA from last negotiation (and pay that is already 10k on average less than neighboring councils), many people are looking into alternative unions. MUWU was here for a little bit, however that didn't quite take off, seemed a bit off and has shut down. Now, it seems the CFMEU has taken an interest in representing council workers, at least at my council. Many workers have joined the CFMEU as they have a reputation of being hardline, an image the ASU certainly lacks.

A response from the ASU regarding the CFMEU is that the CFMEU will NEVER be allowed at the bargaining table, have NO right of entry (and have, in fact, been barred from site entry by management??), will have NO say during EBA negotiations and do NOT have the right to represent local government worker interests etc. The general message is that if you join the CFMEU at this employer, you're essentially throwing your money away on a union that has no legal standing to represent you.

Could this be accurate? Union membership is already lower than it should be for a council and splitting membership is not a good thing, especially if we're just being taken for a ride by the CFMEU, however I find it hard to believe that would be the case. I personally think a shakeup is needed, however I want to be informed before making any membership changes, especially with what seems like a lot of hearsay floating around.

Thank you for any insight :)

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I wish someone had gotten photos of it flying above the strike camp in 1891.

Does anyone have any pics that may be a contender? Or just interesting early photos of it being flown?

I have a casual job which includes a 25% casual loading. When I work Sundays I only earn double time on the base rate rather than on the whole lot. Is this legal? Didn't find it on Fair Work. Thanks.

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I've found myself repeatedly reaching out to my manager/supervisor at Australia Post regarding payment discrepancies throughout my time there. It's become a bit of a routine, unfortunately, with these errors consistently working out in their favor, resulting in underpayments for me.

It's surprising how many of my coworkers struggled to navigate their payslips, given the irregularity of the pay schedule. With overtime payments coming in four weeks after the work was done, it's easy to forget the specifics of exact times.

Another frustrating aspect was the pressure to sign away holiday leave if you finished your run early. Otherwise, you'd be stuck twiddling your thumbs in a sweltering shed until the designated finish time. When we raised these issues with the union, I was disheartened by their lack of action. It felt like our concerns were swept under the rug, leaving me with little faith in their ability to advocate for us. Possibility corruption???

Hey Crew,

I've recently been employed by a "big steel" company & keen to explore joining a union. Can anyone here share their experiences with the NSW Steel workers? I've heard it's a bit of a toothless tiger by a couple of people in the bigger pool of the company, but I'd like more feedback from others.

We are a newly established arm of a company owned by a bigger company and have just began EA negotiations (no actual bargaining has started, only 2 meetings - 1 to introduce and 1 to clarify clauses and raise questions for clarification).

A caveat: no one (yet) is in the union in this (very) new crew and we don't have any information about our union on site.

Copied and pasted from my post in the Aus Legal sub:

Negotiating a new EA (steel manufacturing) - are we heading in the right direction?

We are a team of 9 operators in the steel manufacturing industry in NSW.

The workplace is brand new and requires it's first EA to be negotiated with the team.

Key points:

• current pay rate is slightly above award
• all penalties and other aspects are pretty award standard
• as our skill levels and competencies go up, so do our classified levels (this is yet to be determined in terms of assessment criteria as well as opportunities to do so).
• our crew is the first on this site and will be helping develop SOPs (new manufacturing line), have experience from absolute inception of the plant as well as experience with testing and development as required to get it up and running. We are paving the way for future operators and also helping to train new hires/second crew.
• there is a bonus scheme which is based on the company's overall performance (Australia wide)

Currently it is categorised as non-shift work, but there will be a second crew by December and we will then be on rotating shift work rosters (7am-10pm operational hours - so no midnight to 6am).

Questions:

1. What are the obvious things we should be bargaining for?

2. What are the not so obvious but unique to our situation we should consider and bargain for?

3. What has been the best quirky clause you've ever seen added to an EA? (One guy here had in his old EA that employees got a paid day off on their birthday 🤭)

4. What are some traps to watch out for, so as not to shoot ourselves in the foot?

5. Any recommendations for further self learning I should go and research?

Any help is greatly appreciated 👍🏼

Howdy, I have a full weekend ticket for the Melbourne Marxism Conference for sale. I paid 140 early bird price, will sell for 90.

I’d like to hear from anyone who thinks their union is doing a good job gaining young union members - I know most haven’t changed tack, and I’m really disappointed in that, but if yours has, I’d love to hear what’s working.

Just looking for some advice on where to go from here. The union delegate at work (AWU) continually breaches people’s confidentiality. Someone will raise an issue with him for advice, they don’t want to take it any further for the moment and he tells people on his crew and other crews. It’s not just small matters either. People have been sent home after having severe anxiety attacks at work and the next day everyone knows about it because the union rep tells everyone under the guise of caring, but really he just wants people to think he’s the guy in the know. The most recent thing he did was tell at least 20 other people that a fellow co worker was involved in a car accident and killed a child. The worker in the accident was off work for months and within two days of the accident the union rep is telling people. What can be done to stop him? Complain to the the AWU? Is confidentiality a requirement of being a union rep?

Hello to keep this short and sweet I was wondering the most efficient union I am able to join regarding bullying in retail.

On top of this harassment should I document times and dates of happenings before initiating action and or should I contact this person through their email directly, as they fall under a second in command position, beneath manager.

Or should I skip any processes involving direct communication with the individual bullying me and contact Management and Area Management.

I am a senior key holder casual and I aim to maximise the severity of penalty regarding this particular individual who happen to be the second in command. Please let me know of any processes and unions that favour workers to optimise my claim.

Harassment is a combination of both verbal and physical. For further details.

My employer (a global organisation operating in about a dozen countries) recently announced it was closing down the country-specific legal entities that our contracts are currently with and switching to an Employer of Record service. This has caused a lot of controversy for colleagues in certain jurisdictions (particularly France and Germany).

I’m wondering if anyone has knowledge or experience with how EORs are treated under Australian law? Have there been any significant legal / fair work cases involving them? Any potential risks to look out for?

The two main issues I see are:

• term of employment (for things like long service leave, redundancy)
• and that if there was a dispute it would mean taking the EOR to fair work not my real employer and who knows what kind of tactics or union-busting lawyers they might use

We should inherently comprehend that the capitalist system of consuming our skills and invalidating their importance is all part of the corporate machinations to keep workers blue collar on a global western scale. this is why IT wages are in reverse globally whilst other professions who deal with way less stress and job pressures wages are increasing it is the only white collar profession where job agencies have halved the incomes of the profession in 20 years . Its become the new exploit class. We must all unite and fight the corporatisation of our nation and the constant ratcheting authoritarian regime that controls us in the two party system designed to prevent any meaningful change in the ideological herding funnel. We must start taking action against the foreign aggressors who are determined to turn this nation into a imperialist slave backwater. With no rights. And its visible everywhere. The following of the zionist control mechanisms in Israel and America will be Australia's epic doom. Our war was never with Russia and China. it was always against our own psychopathic self chosenite owners.

Job agencies should be outlawed on a national level. all they do is steal workers cpi increase every year and have created an entire parasite industry living off the backs of workers and their future. and making billions from it at the same time. The corruption in Australia is at a level that is not matched anywhere in the world but Ukraine. utter systemic corruption which serves the US corporate interests. and Australian nationals don't even get a seconds thought. In a normal world. that is called mass treason.