Pub­li­ca­tions

Mar 9, 2018

Swear­ing in the work­place: The legal position

The recent Full Bench deci­sion of the Fair Work Com­mis­sion (FWC) in Illawar­ra Coal Hold­ings Pty Ltd T/A South32 v Matthew Gosek [2018] FWCFB 749 (Illawar­ra Coal), which gar­nered exten­sive media cov­er­age, has once again put the spot­light on the issue of swear­ing by employees. Swear­ing in the work­place is more com­plex…

Feb 13, 2018

Work­place Rela­tion­ships: The Legal Position

With recent devel­op­ments in Aus­tralian pol­i­tics, and the con­tin­ued focus on the inter­na­tion­al #MeToo move­ment, a top­ic that is present­ly being wide­ly dis­cussed is that of work­place relationships. There is a com­mon per­cep­tion that they are now, in all cas­es, imper­mis­si­ble. A few media com­men­ta­tors have lament­ed that they met their part­ner at…

Feb 8, 2018

Lack of pro­ce­dur­al fair­ness does­n’t nec­es­sar­i­ly mean unfair dismissal

In arti­cles and pre­sen­ta­tions on unfair dis­missal the impor­tance of pro­ce­dur­al fair­ness is a recur­ring theme.  This reflects sec­tions 387 (b) and (c ) of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) which stip­u­late that, in con­sid­er­ing whether it is sat­is­fied that a dis­missal was harsh, unjust or unrea­son­able, the Fair Work Com­mis­sion (FWC)…

Jan 31, 2018

Prin­ci­pal Con­trac­tors: The Rules of Engagement

The role of prin­ci­pal con­trac­tor is crit­i­cal in man­ag­ing the work health and safe­ty risks on con­struc­tion projects. Even so, mis­un­der­stand­ings still arise as to the appli­ca­tion of the rules relat­ing to the engage­ment of prin­ci­pal con­trac­tors under the Work Health & Safe­ty Reg­u­la­tions 2017 (NSW) (WHS Reg­u­la­tions). (These rules are in…

Jan 19, 2018

Sex­u­al Harass­ment in the Post-Wein­stein Age What’s Next for Employers? 

The Post-Wein­stein Age The down­fall of one-time Hol­ly­wood heavy­weight Har­vey Wein­stein is increas­ing­ly look­ing like a sem­i­nal event, caus­ing a par­a­digm shift in the way sex­u­al harass­ment (and the bul­ly­ing and vic­tim­i­sa­tion that often accom­pa­nies such behav­iour) is addressed in the community. The Wein­stein alle­ga­tions opened the flood­gates, act­ing as a cat­a­lyst for numer­ous claims…