The Fair Work Commission (FWC) has received a new record number of lodgments for financial year 2025-2026, as its president hints at further legislative changes to ease the growing workload that's putting the organisation under pressure.

Justice Adam Hatcher, president of the FWC, revealed last week that total lodgments before the commission surged to 53,617 cases in FY 2025-26.

It reflects the ballooning number of cases filed before the FWC in the last three financial years, after last year logged a total of 44,075 lodgments.

"This has obviously presented a challenge for the Fair Work Commission, but it is also obviously a challenge for employers, who are having to respond to a much greater number of applications," Hatcher said, in a presentation at the Australian Industry Group's PIR Conference, on 8 September.

Further legislative changes

The new record comes as the Australian government introduced a Building Cooperative Workplaces amending legislation to ease the growing workload of the FWC.

It removes the need for the commission to determine jurisdictional objections to general protections applications concerning whether there was in fact a dismissal before conducting a conference.

"The effect of the amendment has been to remove the need to make some hundreds of decisions per year, meaning we can move more quickly and efficiently to the conference stage to carry out our primary function of trying to resolve the dispute through conciliation," Hatcher said.

But while he...

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