In a landmark ruling today on franchisors' IR compliance obligations, the Federal Court has imposed a $1.44 million fine on a coffee chain for its franchisees' underpayments and record-keeping breaches.
The FWC's expert panel has this morning approved a 3.75% increase in all award rates and the national minimum wage, but has rebuffed the ACTU's bid for an immediate additional 4% for workers in highly-feminised industries, instead committing to a timetable to address the issue over the next 12 months.
The Federal Court has held that two Victorian public sector nurses broke their continuous service while taking time off to have children and recover from surgery as casuals, dismissing an ANMF bid to sue a health service for denying them long service leave.
The FWC has acknowledged there is a "high bar" to overturning management decisions but ultimately found that Ambulance Victoria breached its agreement when it directed a paramedic to perform alternative duties from home while it investigated a colleague's s-xual harassment claims against him.
A "wealthy" global sports company's mistaken belief that a sacked manager took unapproved days off has contributed to a judge finding that it should be hit with only 25% of the maximum penalty for taking three months to pay out his annual leave entitlements.
A FWC full bench has hosed down a commissioner's allegation that a failure to provide a worker 14 hours of "leisure time" bordered on "wage theft", but has upheld his finding that the worker should have received the additional leave.
The FWC is inviting submissions by June 11 on a "right to disconnect" audit of all 155 modern awards focusing on terms involving spans of hours, notice, supervisory duties, and requirements to remain on call, on standby or return to duty.
Sydney University will not have to reinstate a lecturer sacked five years ago for superimposing a swastika on an image of an Israeli flag, after a full Federal Court majority found he could not prove that his "incendiary" conduct fell under intellectual freedom protections.
The SDA says its challenge to a Victorian/Tasmanian Aldi deal on the basis that it tries to circumvent new "same-job, same-pay" laws has prompted the company to quietly ditch similar provisions from a proposed SA deal immediately before an unsuccessful ballot.
ASU officials will no longer have to be escorted to the bathroom when exercising entry rights at the ATO after the FWC found it an unreasonable request, while giving union delegates "time release" to accompany them would be "frankly quite ridiculous".
