Australia's largest bus operator has been fined $181,000 after a judge considered an internal email to its chief executive warning of the "very real possibility of being accused of 'wage theft'" if it did not pay more than 750 drivers an overdue wage increase.
The High Court has today unanimously ruled that judges can take into account the CFMMEU's history of contraventions when assessing fines for breaches of industrial laws, clearing the way for the ABCC to seek maximum penalties for relatively minor infractions.
Spotless has been fined $17,500 after falsely telling an accountant who had worked at the company for more than 30 years that he would not be receiving a redundancy payment because of a change to the law.
The Federal Court has set a seven-week trial to hear Adero Law's class actions against Coles and Woolworths in tandem with FWO underpayment claims against the retailers, while the law firm seeks about a third of a $2.2 million settlement with Drakes and Foodland.
A full Federal Court has halved fines imposed on the CFMMEU and one of its officials after finding that the evidence in the ABCC's "factually confused" case failed to establish that an official pushed over a project manager during an entry dispute.
The NSW Nurses and Midwives’ Association faces the possibility of big fines after NSW Health initiated legal action alleging that its recent industrial action breached IRC anti-strike orders.
The AWU has admitted to more than 24,000 historic contraventions of registered organisations' obligations to report their membership numbers, a Senate Estimates committee has heard.
The Federal Government should consider outlawing wage theft as an anti-competitive practice while also introducing a criminal offence for the worst cases, according to a Senate inquiry on unlawful underpayment.
