He dreamed a dream of awards gone by

OH, TO DREAM OF SIMPLER RATES

According to The Australian ($), the Morrison government has flagged three priorities under their industrial relations reform agenda: simplified hospitality and tourism awards, deals preventing legal industrial action for the life of major projects, and, as an olive branch to unions, increasing the ability of casuals to request permanent employment.

As he prepares to begin a three-month negotiation process next week, Christian Porter has told The Age that the Coalition will take legislation to Parliament “one way or the other”, without the requirement for a high level of agreement from the five new working groups.

CAN THE UNION KEEP US STRONG? After Scott Morrison refused to guarantee to AM’s Sabra Lane that no worker would be worse off under the proposed reforms, ACTU Secretary Sally McManus told ABC she would never agree to seeing pay or conditions go backwards.

McManus did, however, empathise with employers over enterprise bargaining complexities, and even wrote in today’s Oz ($), so I guess we really are breaking bread.

$1.2 TRILLION? EU CAN SAY THAT AGAIN

The European Commission has unveiled a €750 billion (A$1.2 trillion) recovery package designed in large part to support pandemic — and before that, austerity — ravaged EU members, Italy and Spain.

CNN reports that the deal, which would require approval from all 27 members, would raise funds on financial markets through its 2021-27 budget. Roughly two-thirds of funds would be distributed via grants with the remainder offered as loans.

ITALY & SPAIN V FRUGAL FOUR: While Germany, France, and a number of other nations support the deal, draft plans were slammed by a bloc known as the “frugal four” — Denmark, Sweden, Austria and, most infamously, the Netherlands — that exclusively wants to stick to loans.

For more on why they oppose plans for “coronabonds” that leverage the union’s shared balance sheet — and why a ‘No’ vote could absolutely mean the end of the EU — check out The Worm’s sister newsletter, Coronavirus Government Global Briefing.

TRUMP IS FINALLY FACT CHECKED

In maybe the first example of fact-checking that’s ever phased him, Donald Trump has lashed out at Twitter for adding “get the facts” links to his demonstrably false allegations that expanding mail-in voting “would be a free-for-all on cheating, forgery and the theft of ballots”.

While Trump accused Twitter of interfering in the 2020 election and made vague threats of regulation and even shutting the social media giant, Reuters/AP reports that he can not unilaterally regulate or close companies, which requires action by Congress or the Federal Communications Commission.

FEARS OF A VOTING POOR: Not only is there no evidence that mail-in voting leads to higher levels of fraud than in-person voting — we do it, along with a bunch of other countries — Trump himself voted by mail earlier this year. He has, however, claimed that expanding the option would hurt the Republican party, which is spending millions in lawsuits this year to combat voting rights.

BAD NEWS DAY

Finally, within weeks of the suspension of 152 regional newspapers and the closure of BuzzFeed Australia and 10Daily, both The Age and The Guardian report that News Corp is poised to cut hundreds of jobs in a shift towards digital-only publishing for local and regionals and increased copy-sharing amongst metros.

PS: Please note the Harvey Norman ads on almost every front page today.

STATE WRAP: WA, NT NAME RECOVERY ADVISORY GROUPS