Documents Guthrie, Robert 4 results

"The engagement of ‘non-citizens', ‘aliens', and ‘undocumented workers' for work raises a number of delicate employment law and policy issues. This paper considers the attitude of the courts in the United States (US) to the question of the rights of workers who work contrary to immigration laws (illegal workers)1 and will focus on the recent case law in relation to workers' compensation entitlements. In the US the case law on the rights of illegal workers to workers' compensation is unclear and heavily dependent upon local State legislation and judicial attitudes. It has also been heavily influenced by the Supreme Court decision of Hoffman Plastic Compounds v National Labor Relations Board, which dealt with the rights of undocumented workers to make claims for wages consequent upon unfair termination of the employment contract. This paper explores the different judicial and legislative approaches to the rights of illegal workers to workers' compensation, and proposes a possible humanitarian response to the difficult problem of the injured illegal worker."

"Labour law in Australia is undergoing an unprecedented transformation. Fuelled by demands from big business and a dramatically changing constitutional landscape, the locus of regulation is shifting from the states and territories to the federal government. The most conspicuous illustration to date has been in the mainstream industrial relations arena as epitomized by the Howard Conservative Coalition Government's Work Choices legislation. More recently, the Rudd Labour Government has championed a national approach to occupational health and safety law based on its ‘cooperative federalism' agenda. Though less pronounced, workers' compensation for injury at work has also been the subject of growing business demands for greater national regulation. In examining this issue, this paper will first of all outline previous attempts to develop a national workers' compensation framework before turning to a consideration of more recent policy and legal developments, which have contributed to the emerging regulatory realignment of workers' compensation laws and policy. The paper will also identify the major constraints on the drive for a national regulatory framework."

"This paper deals with various topical issues in relation to illegal workers. The legal rights of illegal workers have become an international concern. In this paper two common law countries are examined. The engagement of illegal workers raises a number of delicate employment law and policy issues. This article compares the attitude of the courts in England and Australia in relation to the question of the rights of workers who work contrary to immigration laws (illegal workers). In England, the courts have tended to adopt a traditional approach of not enforcing contracts which are tainted by illegality in relation to cases involving payment of wages and termination of employment. This has often meant that workers employed illegally have no rights to enforce agreements with employers who are a party to the illegal agreement. However, in relation to discrimination cases the English courts have used a number of devices to sidestep this harsh approach, and recently a number of workers who have been engaged illegally have been successful in establishing that their employer has discriminated unlawfully against them. Within the last decade in Australia the picture is even less clear with a mixture of outcomes in relation to cases by workers claiming wages when they have been working illegally. No discrimination cases have emerged in Australia, although this paper speculates that the Australian courts may be receptive to adopting the English approach."