FWA has upheld the St Vincent de Paul Society's dismissal for misconduct of an IT manager who deliberately stopped emails from reaching the mobile phone of the organisation's IR manager.

Senior Deputy President Jonathan Hamberger found that the information systems infrastructure manager had deliberately disabled the ActiveSync software that allowed the workplace relations manager, Cameron McInerney, to access email on his mobile devices.

The IT manager disabled the system after arguing with McInerney about the organisation’s motor vehicle policy.

IT security company Calamity investigated the IT manager's actions and confirmed that he had disabled the ActiveSync software.

Senior Deputy President Hamberger also accepted that the IT manager (who he said was an unreliable witness) accessed the email accounts of a number of employees, without their permission or knowledge.

Calamity's investigation indicated that he had concentrated on the accounts of McInerney and St Vincent de Paul NSW chapter chief financial officer Peter Miller.

Senior Deputy President Hamberger said the IT manager's conduct had been "completely at odds" with the organisation's reasonable expectation that he act with a high degree of integrity and honesty.

Disabling the ActiveSync and the unauthorised access to email accounts were "clear instances of misconduct", he said, and this was compounded by the lack of honesty in his response to the allegations.

Senior Deputy President Hamberger added that there was no evidence to support the IT manage’s allegation that he was bullied by McInerney.

"I indicate for the record that I saw no evidence that that the [IR manager] had been bullied by anyone".

Mr Mark Williams v St Vincent de Paul Society [2011] FWA 6457 (27 September 2011)