The Howard government’s draconian Work Choices laws will soon be history. A change of government at the 2007 federal election means that Australian industrial relations legislation will continue to be a turbulent field, for some time yet. This review provides an account of the last piece of...

In 2009, two major pieces of industrial legislation were enacted to give effect to the Labor Government’s commitment to replace Work Choices with laws for ‘Fair Work’. The Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) promises to bring greater stability and simplicity to Australia’s workplace relations...

This paper examines the impact of English and Australian unfair dismissal legislation on the common law rules which govern the termination of the employment contract. To explore this issue, the paper first outlines some general approaches to the interaction between statute law and the common...

In March 2008, the Rudd Government started to dismantle Work Choices. The Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Act 2008 (Cth) reintroduced agreement-making safeguards, and removed the option of making Australian Workplace Agreements. The legislation also provided...

In 2005, Professor Phillipa Weeks published an insightful chapter entitled ‘Employment Law – A Test of Coherence Between Statute and Common Law' in S Corcoran and S Bottomley (eds) Interpreting Statutes. That chapter examined the emergence, development and ultimate emasculation of an implied...

Despite the promise of cataclysmic change, 2003 saw very few, and very moderate reforms to industrial laws. The great debates about a unitary industrial relations system, greater legal discipline for the building and construction industry, paid maternity leave, compulsory individual contracts in...

At the federal level, the year 2001 saw much legislative activity in the form of bills, debates, revisions and rejections - but very little progress for the government's 'third wave' industrial reform program. Apart from some changes to the unfair dismissals regime, much important legislation...

Legislation proposed and passed in 2002 continued to demonstrate the close alliance between law and politics in this field. While the Federal government pressed on with its Workplace Relations third wave (the Registration and Accountability of Organisations legislation being its only significant...

The federal government finally secured passage of some of its workplace relations amendments in 2004 - the transmission of business provisions for certified agreements, introduction of interim section 127 orders and some increased penalties for bad behaviour - and it dealt promptly with the...