ENTERPRISE AGREEMENTS – approval – ss.185, 604 Fair Work Act 2009 – appeal – Full Bench – at first instance the Commission approved the JBU Enterprise Agreement 2016 – two grounds for appeal – that the Commission erred in failing to properly undertake the task to be satisfied that the Agreement had been genuinely agreed by the employees covered by the Agreement; and to be satisfied that the Agreement did not contain any unlawful terms – Transport Workers’ Union (TWU) applied for leave to intervene in the appeal in order to make a submission – appellant supported the intervention application – Full Bench considered that the submissions that the TWU proposed making if leave to intervene were granted, would largely be a repetition of the submissions of the appellant – Full Bench held submissions by a non-party to an appeal wishing to intervene which propose to duplicate and merely support the submissions to be advanced by a party on appeal are of little assistance and as such do not provide a proper basis for the Commission to permit such submissions to be made by way of intervention or otherwise – unnecessary to determine whether permission to appeal should be granted and whether the appeal should be upheld by reference to the two grounds of appeal initially advanced by appellant – instead, Full Bench have decided to grant permission to appeal and to uphold the appeal on procedural fairness grounds based on previously undisclosed ex parte communications passing between the Chambers of the Commissioner and Broadspectrum which traversed material facts in dispute and appear to have had a material effect on the outcome of the application for the approval of the Agreement – to the extent necessary permission granted to appellant to amend its notice of appeal to include a ground concerning the ex parte communications – Full Bench have taken the unusual course of allowing the matter to be raised at the hearing of the appeal because the existence and extent of the communications and their impact on the decision to approve the Agreement was not known to appellant until Broadspectrum filed its submissions on the appeal on 16 January 2017 – LCR Group considered – no suggestion that the ex parte communications were entered into deliberately in the sense that a deliberate decision was taken to exclude the appellant – permission to appeal granted because Full Bench considered the appeal raised important issues about the practice and procedure of the Commission concerning communications with parties in relation to extant proceedings – appeal upheld on procedural fairness grounds – decisions quashed – application for approval of the Agreement remitted to Kovacic DP for determination. Appeal by United Voice against decisions of Riordan C of 15 November 2016 [[2016] FWC 7936] and 18 November 2016 [[2016] FWCA 8209] Re: Broadspectrum (Australia) P/L t/a Broadspectrum
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