SunSuper indicated that if a clause was to be inserted it should be named as a default fund. The Australian Workers Union indicated that it supported the SunSuper submission and said no more. The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union submitted that there should be a superannuation clause if only to provide for a requirement that employers continue to make contributions while an employee is on workers’ compensation. “None of these submissions have persuaded us that a clause dealing with superannuation should be in this award.” McGuinness said Auscoal had raised with the principal parties that there was an opportunity to include superannuation, and was aware that SunSuper had made a submission. “We were in agreement that it wasn’t required in the circumstances,” he said.

“We’re an industry that
doesn’t have a lot of new players, it’s a very expensive industry to start up
in, so the bigger players have all been supportive of the fund in the past and
we don’t see that’s going to change going forward.” In early April the AIRC
released the second tranche of revised awards including details of their
default superannuation funds. The revisions, which cover a total of 44 awards,
are part of a modernisation process commenced last year following a formal
request by the Federal Government. The award modernisation requires the AIRC to
modernise more than 2400 awards before the commencement of the Government’s
foreshadowed new workplace relations system in January 2010.