John Goss Projects Pty Ltd (the company) is an electrical contracting firm which is currently performing work on a number of projects in the Brisbane area.
The company is in the process of negotiating a new collective agreement with the CEPU which has initiated a bargaining period and has been taking protected industrial action in order to reach an agreement.
The protected industrial action being taken by the union had sufficiently impacted on work being carried out by John Goss Projects on three particular sites in the Brisbane area that the principal contractor, Thiess, was threatening to terminate the company’s contract due to non-performance. John Goss Projects thereupon applied to the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) to have the union’s bargaining period suspended to allow negotiations to proceed during a cooling off period.
S.432 of the Workplace Relations Act 1996 provides for the AIRC to suspend a beginning period for a time if it would be beneficial to the negotiating parties in assisting to resolve the matters at issue.
When proceedings commenced in the AIRC on 19 March, 2009, SDP Richards asked the parties to hold discussions to identify the issues on which they were not agreed. The company and the CEPU held discussions on 19 and 20 March 2009 as a result of which the company sought an adjournment of its application. The parties have agreed to seek assistance from the AIRC by way of alternative dispute resolution during which the union has agreed that it will suspend protected industrial action.