Employment Law

Employment Law is an increasingly diverse and complex field of legal regulation governing employment and industrial rights and obligations. In Australia, it comprises the common law of contract and several overlapping statutory schemes including principally the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth), Commonwealth and State equal opportunity legislation, and work health and safety statutes. These different legal frameworks can only be fully understood and appreciated in their industrial, economic, social, political and public health contexts. Those contexts include international influences, dynamic federal-state relations, the tradition of Australian industrial relations with its values of industrial justice, strategic decision-making and advocacy of industrial associations, labour market trends, social movements of equality, and new forms of business and work organisation.