Some Apple workers in Australia vote to strike over pay, benefits

A union representing Australian employees of iPhone maker Apple Inc voted to strike due to lack of progress on wage negotiations, a union official said on Tuesday.
The one-hour strike planned for Oct. 18 is set to disrupt the tech company’s store operations in the country and add to the pressure it is facing elsewhere on industrial relations.
The union said, the planned strike will involve about 150 of Apple’s 4,000 Australian employees who are represented by the Retail and Fast Food Workers Union (RAFFWU), restricting most customer services in at least three of the company’s 22 stores in the country.
The strike would be the first for Apple in Australia, according to the RAFFWU, and widens the company’s global exposure to collective bargaining just as soaring cost-of-living pressures prompt U.S. employees of Apple and other large firms like Amazon.com Inc to unionise.
In Australia, Apple set off a round of union talks by proposing in August a new set of locked-in wage rises and conditions. The unions and Apple have said, the RAFFWU and two other unions went to an industrial arbiter in September seeking more time to negotiate, which was granted.