News

Feb 15, 2021

Michael Byrnes quot­ed in The Aus­tralian | To vax or not: work­ers’ rights in the age of Covid

Michael Byrnes — Part­ner, Employ­ment & Work­place Health and Safe­ty is quot­ed in The Aus­tralian, To vax or not: work­ers’ rights in the age of Covid.Read the full arti­cle here…

Feb 12, 2021

Unpack­ing the ALP’s pro­posed portable leave policy

To read the full arti­cle click here.…

Feb 3, 2021

Can you be sacked if you refuse a COVID-19 vac­cine? And is neglect­ing an over­dosed friend a crime?

Two recent unfair dis­missal cas­es may pro­vide some insight into whether employ­ers can sack work­ers who refuse a COVID-19 vaccination. Also, a recent deci­sion in the NSW Court of Appeal upholds a manslaugh­ter con­vic­tion involv­ing a fail­ure to help a friend who need­ed urgent med­ical help. Click here to lis­ten to the ABC’s Law Report pod­cast…

Feb 1, 2021

State reg­u­la­tions say you could direct employ­ees back to the work­place – but should you?

HRM dives into the legal and moral con­sid­er­a­tions around forc­ing employ­ees to return to the phys­i­cal work­place. Michael Byrnes fea­tured in HRM Online 25 Jan­u­ary 2021. Click here to read the full article.…

Jan 13, 2021

Michael Byrnes dis­cuss­es work­place vac­ci­na­tion with Brooke Corte on 2GB | 12 Jan­u­ary 2021

Michael Byrnes dis­cuss­es the legal issues relat­ed to manda­to­ry work­place Covid-19 vac­ci­na­tion with Brooke Corte on Mon­ey News on 2GB, 2CC and 4BC on 12 Jan­u­ary 2021 (from 24:45).Click here to lis­ten to the podcast.…

Jan 11, 2021

Michael Byrnes quot­ed in The Aus­tralian | Year of liv­ing cau­tious­ly: return to work nor­mal­cy won’t hap­pen soon

Michael Byrnes is quot­ed in The Aus­tralian on 11 Jan­u­ary in the recent arti­cle ​‘Year of liv­ing cau­tious­ly: return to work nor­mal­cy won’t hap­pen soon’.Read the full arti­cle here.…

Dec 15, 2020

Michael Byrnes dis­cussed work­place Christ­mas par­ties with John Stan­ley on 2GB, 2CC and 4BC | 14 Decem­ber 2020 (from 1:49:50)

Michael Byrnes dis­cussed work­place Christ­mas par­ties with John Stan­ley on 2GB, 2CC and 4BC | 14 Decem­ber 2020 (from 1:49:50)Lis­ten to the pod­cast here…

Dec 7, 2020

Michael Byrnes dis­cuss­es with HRM | What’s a ​‘com­plaint’? $1 mil­lion Fed­er­al Court appeal holds lessons for HR

A dete­ri­o­rat­ing rela­tion­ship between an HR leader and an exec­u­tive led to a rul­ing against their com­pa­ny. The appeal reveals how com­plex work­place law can be.Read full arti­cle here…

Dec 7, 2020

Michael Byrnes dis­cuss­es with HRM | Can work­places man­date COVID-19 vaccines?

Work­places are con­tem­plat­ing how to nav­i­gate a vac­cine and the pos­si­bil­i­ty of man­dat­ing it for employ­ees. Because of this, all eyes were on the Fair Work Com­mis­sion as it recent­ly con­sid­ered the case of an ear­ly child­hood teacher who was ter­mi­nat­ed for not get­ting the flu vaccine. Read full arti­cle here …

Dec 2, 2020

Michael Byrnes & Emi­ly Capen­er are quot­ed in Lawyers Week­ly | Can law firms man­date COVID-19 vac­ci­na­tions for employees?

In prepar­ing the office for returns to work en masse, one poten­tial option law firms may be think­ing about is the loom­ing vac­cine for COVID-19, which — accord­ing to Health Min­is­ter Greg Hunt — should be avail­able to Aus­tralians in approx­i­mate­ly four months’ time. Such a direc­tive from legal employ­ers, Swaab…