An "openly gay" head chef sacked for allegedly molesting female co-workers has won $16,000 compensation, after the FWC found it "more than coincidental" that his employer decided that s-xual harassment provided a valid reason for summary dismissal before it emailed employees a survey full of loaded questions.
A judge has told an employment and IR forum that the Federal Circuit and Family Court's small claims jurisdiction is an "area to watch" in the light of a five-fold expansion of its compensation cap to $100,000, "fast outcomes" and its ability to determine casual conversion disputes.
The FWC has upheld the sacking of a mineworker for failing to disclose his use of prescription medicinal cannabis on his days off, despite the fact he passed all drug tests and left a 32-hour buffer before the start of his working weeks.
New DEWR data has undercut RBA warnings about the risks of a wage-price spiral, indicating that private sector bargained wage growth remains anchored below 4% a year.
In what is believed to be the first workplace breastfeeding discrimination ruling, a tribunal has found that a KFC franchisee indirectly discriminated against a worker when it told her to express milk in a tent, within a storeroom with no door.
The process of obtaining an entry permit should be "no more than onerous" than that for a passport unless there are "good grounds" for suspecting the applicant might not be a fit and proper person, according to the Booth-Hamberger review of regulation of registered organisations.
The FWC will consider the late unfair dismissal claim of a worker who believes his employer sacked him for alleged sexual harassment, after receiving evidence that five law firms rejected his case on one day alone.
A FWC full bench has this afternoon issued the first supported bargaining authorisation under the Secure Jobs provisions, opening the way for the UWU, AEU and IEU to negotiate a deal on behalf of 12,000 employees with 64 early childhood education and care employers.
Queensland Catholic school teachers and support staff have rejected an employer deal by a narrow margin after the IEU labelled it "punitive" and warned of major cuts, while staff in Religious Institute and Edmund Rice schools have convincingly voted up their unilateral offer.
Striking Ingham's workers in two states are set to earn an average $100 more a week under an in-principle agreement struck on the back of 24-hour stoppages and a rancorous picket, after the FWC found that it could not make a s418 order to stop the blockade.