An accountancy firm and its principal must pay penalties totalling almost $70,000 for failing to comply with FWO notices to produce documents linked to to its client's "grossly inadequate" employee record-keeping.
The Federal Court has flayed the Republic of Italy for failing to heed Australian IR laws in its local consulates and has ordered it to pay a $94,000 fine, $7500 compensation and indemnity costs to an administrative employee after it failed to pay him annual leave loading for six years, to keep records in English and to produce the records on demand.
A senior FWC member has delved into arbitral history to offer his own definition of a 'seven day shiftworker' after expressing frustration that there is no "simple" or "unambiguous" description of the term in the many awards it is employed.
A judge has held that an "instant" online script did not excuse an underpaying employer from having to attend a penalty hearing, while also warning that in future the court is unlikely to accept certificates from providers using the model adopted by the Wesfarmers-owned service.
A court has issued rare orders compelling a former economics professor to face FWO questions under oath about his capacity to pay penalties and compensation arising from underpayment judgments handed down in 2019 and 2020.
A director's argument that he is well qualified to represent his company in an underpayments case has fallen flat, a court citing a "lack of objectivity" as being among the reasons to reject the proposition.
An employer seeking to be covered by an existing agreement could potentially "operate in a better way" if a clause granting five days leave in return for working on three public holidays is removed, but the FWC has found the change would deny employees the chance to use the entitlement as a bargaining chip.
A FWC full bench has upheld a ruling that BHP must continue to deduct a $60 weekly housing subsidy from remote mineworkers' pay, saying that the company halted the deductions to remove tenancy rights, rather than as an "act of gratuitous generosity".
Shine Lawyers says the exclusion of thousands of SDA members from its McDonald's class action will "inform future interplay" between union and non-union representative proceedings, while a full court ruling has set a "powerful precedent" for using collective action to protect workers' rights.
The High Court has this afternoon declined to hear DEWR's challenge to a ruling that limits funds available to pay employee entitlements when a company goes under.
