Canberra stands up a tripartite AI Employment and Workplaces Forum
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Canberra stands up a tripartite AI Employment and Workplaces Forum

The federal government has stood up an elevated AI Employment and Workplaces Forum, announced by Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Amanda Rishworth at the [AFR Workforce Summit in Sydney](https://ministers.dewr.gov.au/rishworth/afr-workforce-summit-sydney), with the first ministerial-level meeting held the same day. The forum is tripartite: government, employer groups and unions at one table, delivering on a National AI Plan commitment. Its work is organised around five themes: trust, capability, transparency, safety and productivity. The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations is also running a gap analysis of how existing workplace frameworks interact with AI adoption. The sentence HR teams should clip is Rishworth's boundary-setting: "Tripartism does not, and should not, involve a right of veto." Unions get a seat and a voice on workplace AI, not a brake. The minister framed the goal as working out how to capture productivity benefits together rather than litigating each deployment. The signal for employers: consultation expectations on workplace AI are about to firm up, and a forum communique will be an easy benchmark for what good looks like.

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