Although The Register isn't the highest quality of journalism, they're far better than the lowest quality, and they do a decent job in this article. The usage of quotation marks to report on allegations without directly asserting them is very common across the entire journalism industry, including the most well-respected publications. Both clickbait and non-clickbait articles use that convention.
Also, headlines are usually written by editors and not by the article authors. Headlines for use online do indeed focus on getting clicks, because they need the ad money to pay the bills, especially when they don't have a paywall. That's true even when the article content is high-quality and not clickbait.
Last thought: The Register actually has two titles for this article at the same time. The HN title is taken from the headline at the top of the page, which is fair enough. But the version of the title in my browser tab is "NLRB claims Apple broke law by terminating labor organizer". Would that make the journalism seem any more real than the shorter, snappier version using quotation marks and short-hand jargon like "dev"? It's the same article either way.