Employment Minister Michaelia Cash has made three new deputy president appointments to the Fair Work Commission - two with a strong resource sector employer background and the third from employer clientele law firm Seyfarth Shaw.
A Coca-Cola employee who threatened to fight a colleague in the workplace carpark and made coarse gestures suggesting he was a company stooge has lost his unfair dismissal bid.
A court has found an employer took unlawful adverse action against a pregnant worker when it sacked her for taking time off to manage morning sickness and other issues arising from her condition.
The FWC has refused to take the "extraordinary step" of temporarily restraining an employer from appointing an employee to fill the role of an allegedly bullied worker.
An employer has convinced a court that it did not take unlawful adverse action when its HR manager decided to dismiss an employee who had lodged a bullying and harassment complaint.
An FWC full bench has granted an employee who mistakenly lodged a general protections application instead of an unfair dismissal claim an extension of time because the Commission should have used its discretion to rectify the mistake.
The FWC is running a trial until the end of the year of holding conferences and hearings on Thursday nights and Saturdays, with priority to be given to matters involving small businesses.
A full Federal Court has found a ship's officer who quit the maritime industry after a bungled investigation into alleged bullying by her captain is entitled to a greater proportion of her costs, but rejected claims for more than $1.6 million in damages.
The FWC has found a vessel operator's decision to sack an experienced captain for breaching its zero-tolerance alcohol policy was harsh in the circumstances, arguing that it bore some responsibility for unresolved matters that affected his mental health and could have imposed less punitive penalties.
