Federal IR Minister Christian Porter has described as "ill-conceived" yesterday's passage through Victorian Parliament of a law creating a criminal offence for deliberate underpayment of wages and establishing a state-based wage inspectorate with wide investigative powers.
In a significant decision on agreement-making, an FWC full bench has clarified that the tribunal must reject any undertakings that have a "transformative" effect such that they could have affected workers' votes.
The FWC has upheld the summary dismissal of a truck driver who failed to provide a urine sample after a three-hour wait at a medical clinic, finding he did not make a reasonable effort to fix the problem.
The FWC has upheld a South32 mine's sacking of a long-serving supervisor, finding he engaged in fraud when he deliberately manipulated his overtime payments.
After confirming a company's deregistration is no barrier to determining an unfair dismissal claim, the FWC has found the sacking complied with the small business dismissal code but has referred "questionable practices" to the ATO and Home Affairs.
The FWC has let a construction company bin a 5% pay rise that came into effect in February plus next year's increase, despite CFMMEU evidence that some workers felt pressured to support the COVID-19 variation in a ballot that identified their vote.
A pandemic-affected employer has succeeded in having redundancy payments to four workers slashed by almost 70%, the FWC finding its perilous cash position and obligation to remaining employees outweighed the impact on the quartet.
Court finding on notice period change shredded; Call to halt wage theft law until working party concludes; Industry super paper concedes employees might bear costs of super rises; and $15K for academic in "labyrinthine" case.
In a significant decision considering representative error, a solicitor has failed to convince the FWC that his miscalculations in filing a late unfair dismissal application justified an extension, after the worker waited 15 days to confirm she wanted to proceed.
NSW Health must compensate a registered nurse for lost shift penalties and refrain from rostering her on morning and night shifts after a tribunal found it indirectly discriminated against her on the basis of her hearing impairment.
