A federal court judge has in fining an underpaying juice shop operator almost $35,000 flatly rejected "cultur[al] differences" as a mitigating factor, lamenting instead the frequency with which ethnically diverse employers exploit their own communities.
In a significant decision on FWO investigative powers under recent laws stiffening protections for vulnerable workers, the Federal Court has rejected a franchisor's bid to have declared void a notice to produce documents created before the legislation came into force.
Days before SA's largest private employer is due to defend a class action on behalf of thousands of its convenience store workers, a tribunal has in awarding almost $65,000 in penalties to an underpaid console operator found it still at risk of non-compliance.
The NTEU says it is preparing a "wave of class actions" and will "open the rule book" in pursuing other avenues to recover millions of dollars in underpayments on behalf of highly casualised university employees.
The FWO has confirmed it is now investigating three universities after the University of Sydney became the latest to reveal multimillion-dollar underpayments, while the NTEU blames mass casualisation for creating the conditions for "wage theft".
Woolies class action back before court in September; FWC rebuffs CFMMEU bid to stop BHP labour hire deployment; and Reinstatement for worker accused of "racially divisive" statements.
In levelling a $22,440 penalty against the former owner-operator of a labour-hire company that underpaid 80 workers on a Queensland mushroom farm more than $78,000, a court has noted the FWO did not seek compensation.
Qantas has launched a Federal Court case against the FAAA to clarify whether it can keep paying fortnightly penalty rates in arrears while receiving JobKeeper, as the ASU accuses it of "stealing" by counting them against the wrong top-up period.
The Queensland Labor government has introduced legislation to criminalise wage theft and to establish a small claims process in the State courts which has conciliation as a first step.
