Unions have accused the NSW government of winding back the state’s industrial umpire so it can attack workers’ rights.
Four Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) judges, including its president Justice Roger Boland, will be taking early retirement in February, the state government announced on Wednesday.
There is only expected to be one judge by the end of 2013.
Treasurer Mike Baird says this is because the IRC is dealing with fewer disputes as a result of the transfer of private sector workers to the federal industrial relations system.
But Unions NSW says workers have a right to have grievances heard by an independent authority.
“We now have so few rights that there isn’t enough work to justify employing judges,” he said on Thursday.
Opposition industrial relations spokesman Adam Searle says workers need a properly resourced, independent umpire.
“Given there has been a significant backlog of more than 1000 cases in the IRC … (the) decision will only reduce the commission’s ability to carry out their important work,” he said.
“The O’Farrell government capped the wages for nurses, teachers and firefighters and then took away the ability of the NSW IRC as the independent umpire to give workers a fair hearing.”
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