In a decision warning that workplaces are "on notice" to meet far higher standards of behaviour, the FWC has thrown out the unfair dismissal claim of a veteran Alcoa worker held to have groped a female colleague.
In what stands as a forensic analysis of disciplinary process failings, a judge in a near-300-page judgment has found that a construction giant took adverse action against a senior manager when it sacked him for allegedly intimidating property owners while partying during the 2020 bushfire recovery effort.
A paid agent claiming to have never been told of any complaints about its services has welcomed FWC suggestions to regulate the industry while insisting the Commission should "surgically" root out "bad actors" rather than take a shotgun approach that could raise costs for workers contesting dismissals.
A full Federal Court has clarified the extent to which employers must investigate alternative roles for workers caught up in restructures, finding that a mining company had an obligation to assess whether employees could replace already-engaged contractors before making them redundant.
The Law Council has endorsed the FWC's quest for stricter regulation of paid agents, but warned it off considering the "capacity" of lawyers to act for parties in cases before the Commission.
The FWC is seeking submissions on the latest phase of its research on gender-based occupational segregation, which has been released ahead of this year's annual wage review.
Autistic people need employment support and training, Autism-friendly workplaces and for employers to address hiring biases, according to the draft National Autism Strategy.
In a decision sure to catch the eye of service providers using rostering apps to keep workers at arm's length, the FWC has found that a home care worker who signed two documents describing her as an independent contractor is in fact an employee capable of suing her employer for unlawful dismissal.
The law firm whose advocacy helped spur the FWC to consider regulating paid agents has called for improved "referral pathways" that steer workers contesting their dismissals towards pro bono clearing houses, Legal Aid and the community legal sector.
An experienced former employer-clientele lawyer turned HR manager has suggested that one way of discouraging paid agents from pursuing "unwinnable" cases is to introduce a "threshold" settlement amount below which they cannot charge clients for their services.
