FWC President Adam Hatcher has expressed concern about possible confusion arising from the inclusion in all awards of the new right to disconnect outside of working hours, when some awards "specifically contemplate" out-of-hours contact.
A senior FWC member has rounded on a national business's HR team for the "crude" and disrespectful process it followed to make one of its own members redundant, suggesting it engage in some "sober reflection".
A company did not sack a worker for alleged safety breaches and unprofessional behaviour, but rather took unlawful adverse action when it decided to dismiss him because its national HR manager took his queries about pay and flexible work as "badgering" and harassment, a court has ruled.
The FWC has urged David Jones to improve its retrenchment processes, while opening the way for a long-serving worker to pursue an unfair dismissal case after the department store deemed her unsuitable for redeployment to an area serving "elevated" clientele.
A senior lawyer says finance sector employers should "urgently review" their employment agreements after a finding that a commission-based advisor is award-covered and that a leading wealth management company cannot use those payments to offset his entitlements.
The AiG is calling for the FWC to reject the ACTU's "misguided and inappropriate" draft "right to disconnect" award clause, and AREEA is recommending the final clause mirror the legislation, rather than expand it.
Extending employers' duty of care to the disciplining and sacking of workers would not "frustrate" contractual certainty or disrupt businesses, lawyers for a charity's former consultant have told the High Court.
The MEU has filed 10 "same-job, same-pay" applications targeting BHP coal mines in Queensland, seeking to lift the pay of about 1700 labour hire workers by between $10,000 and $40,000 a year and stamp out a model that has "spread like a cancer" in the industry.
The FWC has refused to reduce two FIFO workers' redundancy pay, finding that redeployment offers did not amount to "other acceptable employment" because they were given insufficient time to consider roster changes that would also have reduced their time at home.
The FWC has found a paramedic is not entitled to a living-away-from-home allowance as he chose rather than was directed to undertake additional training his employer provided 200 kilometres from his residence.
