Recovering unpaid superannuation and bridging the gender pay gap have emerged as Labor's key promises on overhauling workplace laws ahead of the federal election.
A loose commitment to enabling more industry-wide bargaining was also formally adopted in the ALP's policy platform at the party's national conference in Adelaide.
Australian Council of Trade Unions secretary Sally McManus received two standing ovations book-ending her clarion call which lavished praise on Labor leader Bill Shorten.
"The trade union movement is the early warning system for this nation. We are the earthquake sensors in the ocean that feel the tremors before they reach the shores," Ms McManus told delegates.
"We are sounding the alarm now."
Labor will force the Fair Work Commission to consider pay equity as a central objective of the workplace relations system, as well as cracking down on employers who don't pay or underpay superannuation.
It remains unclear which sectors would be covered by Labor's bargaining policy.
Workplace relations spokesman Brendan O'Connor said enterprise bargaining was faltering in some industries and failing in others.
"Where enterprise bargaining has failed, multi-employer bargaining should be an available option," Mr O'Connor said.
Mr Shorten said enterprise bargaining was not doing its job.
"We need a new system set up for the 2020s to recognise the changes in our economy learning the lessons of the past," he said.
Industrial Relations Minister Kelly O'Dwyer accused Labor of hiding a secret deal with unions on the issue.
"Labor knows the impact that industry-wide bargaining will have on the economy, which is why they are refusing to reveal their policy," Ms O'Dwyer said.
"Today Bill Shorten and his team gave the green light to industry-wide strikes."
Labor would pursue industrial manslaughter laws that threaten bosses with jail and massive fines over workplace deaths in the first term of a Shorten government.
WA maritime union official Christy Cain urged delegates to chant "kill a worker - go to jail".
A national strategy will be developed on industrial diseases, after a year in which deadly disease silicosis rocked the stone-cutting industry.
The ACTU also welcomed Labor's commitment to scrap a controversial work-for-the-dole program which is meant to help indigenous people.
On Monday, the conference passed a resolution to ensure a future Labor government would consider whether law firms had "anti-union" history before awarding them government contracts.
"This is very serious stuff, it is a radical shift," Ms O'Dwyer said.
