A principal contractor has been found liable for injuries to one of its subcontractor’s employees after the principal contractor took over a higher level of responsibility for the safe systems of work to be undertaken by the subcontractor. The employee of the subcontractor was engaged to dismantle scaffolding and fell 8 metres onto a concrete […]
In the recent case of Sagona v R & C Piccolo Investments Pty Ltd and Ors, the Federal Circuit Court has ordered the employer and its husband and wife owners to pay $235,000 to an employee who was found to have been discriminated against after she announced that she was pregnant. Background The Applicant in […]
In a recent case before the Fair Work Commission, it was confirmed that breaching a ‘cardinal’ safety rule was a valid reason for dismissing an employee. Interestingly, the employer did not actually rely on the employee’s breach of its safety rules as the reason for his dismissal. Instead it relied on the employee’s repeated dishonest […]
The Fair Work Commission has dismissed an employee’s application for unfair dismissal after the employee provided confidential documents belonging to his employer to his union and to a journalist. The employee was also found to have made disparaging remarks about the CEO of the organisation to other employees. As a result of the employee leaking […]
In The Maritime Union of Australia v DP World Sydney Limited, the Fair Work Commission considered the ability of the employer to unilaterally reject backdated medical certificates based on the wording of an applicable enterprise agreement. The Union asserted that the term ‘backdated medical certificate’ related to a certificate ‘which had been falsely dated so […]
The New South Wales Industrial Relations Commission has decided that a public servant who admitted to touching five of his colleagues breasts’ at a work Christmas function should be reinstated to his position. Facts The employee had consumed a considerable volume of alcohol before attending a workplace function with a number of his work colleagues, […]
The NSW Industrial Relations Commission has ruled that a public servant who admitted to touching five of his colleagues breasts’ at a work Christmas function should be reinstated to his position. The evidence in the case included that the a public servant had consumed a considerable volume of alcohol before attending a workplace function and […]
The Federal Court of Australia has penalised an employer and its director a total of $41,500 following the finding that the employer had taken adverse action against one its employees. Fair Work Ombudsman v AJR Nominees Pty Ltd & Minniti (No 1) In the substantive matter, the Federal Court heard that the employee, who had […]
The County Court of Victoria has imposed a $400,000 fine for a work related accident which resulted in the tragic death of a worker. Whilst investigations into the cause of the worker’s death were not conclusive, it was found that the worker slipped into a hole in a walkway that was left as a result […]
A recent decision of the Fair Work Commission’s Full Bench has provided some clarity about the role of a support person in a termination or performance management process. In the decision of Victorian Association for the Teaching of English Inc v de Laps, the Employee resigned from her employment following the initiation of a performance […]