A franchisor chief executive found in June to have engaged in "predatory and grooming" conduct towards a female employee 40 years his junior has now been ordered to pay her more than $72,000 in damages.
The FWC has temporarily increased the vehicle-related allowances in the SCHADS and aged care awards to compensate workers for the fuel price surge from the Middle East conflict, but has declined to make the change in 39 other awards.
A FWC full bench has refused to delay the phasing-in of junior rates changes, while rejecting SDA arguments that a six-month qualifying period before 18 to 20-year-old retail, fast food and pharmacy workers receive full adult pay should be based on their time under an award rather than length of service with an individual employer.
The FWC will insert a working from home term in the clerical award that provides for employees to request WFH arrangements, but it has found no basis for a "major regulatory intervention" to compel employers to act.
The NSW Industrial Court has found that a worker who started out as a "volunteer trainee" had been an employee and should have been paid, because he worked regularly and "meaningfully contributed" to the business.
A senior FWC member has upheld the sacking of a Services Australia worker who accused a centre manager of having a "barely developed prefrontal cortex" and called a colleague "f---king useless", observing that having ADHD is not a "licence" to abuse co-workers without consequences.
The FWC has backed Whitehaven Coal's refusal to extend unpaid parental leave for a data reporting specialist, in a landmark decision referring to her "bespoke knowledge" and psychological concerns for colleagues dealing with burgeoning workloads.
A court has thrown out a worker's claim that his employer denied him a chance to defend allegations of intimidating a manager because "society today suggests that a female's word is true", finding instead that it sacked him because of performance issues.
In a case highlighting the judicial system's concerns about self-represented litigants using artificial intelligence, a judge has binned a neurophysiologist's "prolix" 191-page statement of claim and ordered her to "permanently delete" confidential information obtained from her former employer, partly out of fears it could find its way into the public domain if she is feeding it into AI.
The FWC has found that Woolworths' managers did not bully an employee when it put her under "undue pressure" as it sought to lift her department's performance, but suggested the retail giant undertake "more proactive intervention" to address issues in the workplace.
