- Title
- Unions and collective bargaining in Australia in 2020
- Creator
- Bray, Mark; Macneil, Johanna; Spiess, Leslee
- Relation
- Journal of Industrial Relations Vol. 63, Issue 3, p. 338-356
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/00221856211003597
- Publisher
- Sage
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2021
- Description
- The sudden and dramatic lockdowns in Australia resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic brought great uncertainty and much change during 2020. This review concentrates on the impacts of these contextual changes on Australian unions and collective bargaining. Union efforts to cooperate with governments in policy-making and with employers at a workplace level were greeted with applause. But other arenas, as the crisis moderated, saw more traditional adversarialism. In particular, the failure of the parties to agree on legislative change meant that the government’s ‘omnibus’ bill, presented to parliament in December, would prove controversial and strongly contested in the new year. The structure and process of collective bargaining seemed to change remarkably little in 2020. A closer examination of the practice and outcomes of collective bargaining, however, suggests continued difficult times for workers and unions.
- Subject
- collective bargaining; cooperation; enterprise agreements; Fair Work Act; industrial disputes; union membership; SDG 8; SDG 9; Sustainable Development Goals
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1443618
- Identifier
- uon:42052
- Identifier
- ISSN:0022-1856
- Language
- eng
- Reviewed
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Collections
Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
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