Industrial disputes tipped to jump as bargaining agreements covering 130,000 workers come to an end

The atmosphere is ripe for more industrial disputation than we’ve seen for some time, an industrial relations lawyer says, as Deutsche Bank notes that agreements covering more than 130,000 employees at listed companies are set to expire by the year’s end.

Lawyer and adviser Peter Vitale says “it wouldn’t be unusual for there to be industrial disquiet when there are a large number of union agreements up for renewal.”

Noting public observations from directors at prominent companies predicting a lot of disruption, Vitale says the ongoing Qantas dispute is not a catalyst for further high-octane industrial battles, but a symptom.

“That [the dispute] reflects unions being emboldened to take action more readily and also adjusting to the nuances of the Fair Work Act and being able to exploit it better,” Vitale says.

“And there’s no reason to think that this won’t happen in other workplaces.”

According to Bloomberg, Deutsche Bank has noted that half of the workers at retail giant Woolworths and almost 14,000 employees at telco giant Telstra will see their agreements expire by the year’s end.

“I don’t know if we’ll go back to the days of beer strikes at Christmas, but I think the atmosphere is definitely ripe for more industrial disputation than we’ve seen for some time,” Vitale says.

Vitale notes that the two companies – Woolworths and Telstra – are a little difficult to predict, with Telstra expected to be less combative under chief executive David Thodey than it was under former CEO Sol Trujillo, and Woolworths’s retail staff typically less likely to cause industrial dramas.

But Andrew Douglas, principal at Macpherson + Kelly, does not expect disputes will dramatically rise over the next couple of months.

“There are peaks and troughs, and high profile disputes that sensitise people to IR,” Douglas says, adding the Deutsche prediction does not reflect the Fair Work Act itself but simply the rollover of enterprise bargaining agreements after Work Choices.

The comments come as the industrial umpire readies to rule on a dispute between nurses and the hospital body in Victoria.

The state referred the dispute to Fair Work Australia, citing public safety, after nurses closed thousands of beds as part of its push for an 18.5% pay rise over four years and the maintenance of nurse-to-patient ratios.

Meanwhile, the Greens chipped in with its proposed amendments to the Fair Work Act, ahead of a Government review of the Act in 2012, calling for the industrial umpire to consider job security and workload clauses when arbitrating.

Greens industrial relations spokesman Adam Bandt says it is “amazing that the Reserve Bank has full employment as one of its statutory obligations yet Fair Work Australia doesn’t,” according to the Australian Financial Review.

“The bill will require FWA to consider job security and workload clauses when arbitrating. This will remove an incentive for powerful employers to escalate disputes, for example by locking out Qantas workers or provoking nurses to take industrial action,” the Member for Melbourne said.

Official figures show the number of disputes, employees involved in disputes and working days lost due to industrial disputation in the June quarter were higher than the previous quarter.

But for the year ended June 2011, there were 22 fewer disputes than the previous year, at 209.