8.00am

Registration and coffee

9.00am

Opening remarks from the chair
Peter Schwab, Managing Editor, Workforce

9.10am

Economic outlook and the impact for IR
David Rumbens, Director, Access Economics

9.50am

Keynote Address: The Opposition’s viewpoint on industrial relations

• Developing an alternative IR policy
• Is there a future for statutory individual contracts?
• The impact of unfair dismissal laws

Julie Bishop, Deputy Opposition Leader and Shadow Minister for Employment, Business & Workplace Relations

10.30am

Morning tea

11.00am

Keynote address: The move towards a national IR system and what it will mean for state jurisdictions

John Mickel, Qld Minister for Employment & Industrial Relations

11.40am

Labor’s plans to restore universal access to unfair dismissal laws

• What will this mean for employers?
• How will it impact on small businesses that were exempt from unfair dismissal claims under Work Choices?

David Gregory, Head of Workplace Relations, Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce & Industry

12.20pm

Unions’ relationship with state governments – and it’s not pretty

• Victorian unions’ relationship with a state Labor government that has been in power for nine years
• What’s happening in other states between unions and Labor

Brian Boyd, Secretary, Victorian Trades Hall Council

1.00pm

Lunch

2.00pm

The Workplace Authority’s experience in applying the new no-disadvantage test

• Advice for practitioners on getting it right when lodging individual and collective agreements

Barbara Bennett, Director, Workplace Authority

2.40pm

The impact of the new performance management framework on public and private sector professionals

• The major implications of the move from the previous performance management framework to the new one
• Challenges for professionals in implementing the new regime
• Contrasting the impacts on public sector professionals with those in the private sector

Peter Fotiades, Director People Systems, MCL, Australian Taxation Office

3.20pm

Afternoon tea

3.50pm

Labor’s substantive WR legislation

• What will the legislation look like?
• What is it likely to contain?
• Hear directly from an adviser to the Federal Government

Val Gostencnik, WR Group Partner, Corrs Chambers Westgarth

4.30pm

The 2008 minimum wage decision and its social and economic impact
Professor Ian Harper, Chair, Australian Fair Pay Commission

5.10pm

Close of day one

5.25pm

Networking Drinks

8.30am

Registration and coffee

8.50am

Opening remarks from the chair
Peter Schwab, Managing Editor, Workforce

9.00am

The role of trade unions in the changing IR environment

• Emerging areas of conflict
• Union views on bargaining and agreement making
• What the ACTU is lobbying for in the substantive legislation
• The significance of community campaigns

Jeff Lawrence, Secretary, Australian Council of Trade Unions

9.40am

The industrial jurisdiction of the Federal Magistrates Court

• The types of matters being heard in the first two years of the Federal Magistrates Court’s industrial jurisdiction
• Outcomes and penalties being handed down
• Advice for practitioners involved in bringing and defending cases
• The industrial jurisdiction of the Federal Court of Australia

Philip Burchardt, Federal Magistrate, Federal Magistrates Court of Australia

10.20am

Morning tea

10.50am

Globalisation and the Australian labour market

• A long-term perspective on Australian labour market reform
• The role of labour market deregulation in the economy
• The efficacy of international trade as a pillar of Australia’s prosperity
• The economic impact of trade union power

Ray Evans, President, HR Nicholls Society

11.30am

What’s happening in the public sector under recent changes

• The new public sector bargaining framework
• Trends in agreement making including collective agreements and common law contracts
• Union representation in the public sector

Stephen Jones, Federal Secretary, Commonwealth Public Sector Union

12.10pm

An industry perspective on award modernisation

• Emerging issues in the priority modernisation process
• What will happen to major awards including in the manufacturing industry
• What modernisation will mean for newer sectors like information technology

Steve Smith, Director National Workplace Relations, Australian Industry Group

12.50pm

Lunch

1.40pm

Skilled migration – solution or short-term fix?
Julie Mills, CEO, Recruitment & Consulting Services Association

2.10pm

Operating in a boom sector of the economy
Jill Lever, General Manager HR (executive GM OZ Minerals - designate), Zinifex Ltd

2.40pm

Afternoon tea

3.10pm

PANEL SESSION: Industrial regulation in the building industry

First-hand experiences with right of entry
Joe McDonald, WA Branch Assistant Secretary, CFMEU

The need for a tough cop on the beat
Christopher Platt, General Manager Workplace Policy, Australian Mines & Metals Association

The powers and prosecutions of the Australian Building & Construction Commission
Marcus Clayton, National Practice Group Leader for Industrial and Employment Law, Slater & Gordon

Questions for the panel

4.40pm

Close of conference