australian workplace agreement

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Agreements

The Fair Work Act does not allow the making of new individual employee agreements. Collective enterprise agreements contain a provision which allows flexibility in the workplace to be achieved by agreement between an employer and an individual employee.

 

Agreements which existed under the Workplace Relations Act will continue in existence under the Fair Work Act 2009 as ‘agreement-based transitional instruments’. These are defined by the Fair Work (Transitional and Consequential Amendments) Act 2009 (TA Act).

 

There are a number of different agreement-based transitional instruments, as a consequence of the two previous workplace relations regimes that operated prior to, and after, WorkChoices.

 

The TA Act identifies the following specific industrial instruments as ‘agreement-based transitional instruments’ recognised by the Fair Work Act:

a notional agreement preserving state awards (NAPSA)

a workplace agreement (includes a collective agreement or Individual Transitional Employment Agreement (ITEA))

a preserved state agreement (includes a preserved individual state agreement)

an Australian Workplace Agreement (AWA)

a pre-reform certified agreement

a pre-reform AWA

an old IR agreement.

The most common of these agreements currently existing in the workplace are NAPSAs, collective agreements, individual agreements and enterprise NAPSAs.

 

There is no ‘sunset’ date for an existing collective or individual registered agreement. A pre-Fair Work Act agreement continue to remain in force unless terminated or replaced in the appropriate manner.

 

Note: the minimum wages and conditions of employment that commenced with the introduction of modern awards and the NES (1 January 2010) override the conditions of an existing agreement that are inconsistent with the Fair Work Act and the minimum wages of modern awards.