A federal court judge has in fining an underpaying juice shop operator almost $35,000 flatly rejected "cultur[al] differences" as a mitigating factor, lamenting instead the frequency with which ethnically diverse employers exploit their own communities.
In a significant decision on FWO investigative powers under recent laws stiffening protections for vulnerable workers, the Federal Court has rejected a franchisor's bid to have declared void a notice to produce documents created before the legislation came into force.
Three payroll officers who "reverse-engineered" false records during an FWO investigation have been fined a total of $121,000 as part of the largest penalty order won by the workplace watchdog.
Service station owners who required a visa-dependent employee to hand over his tax refund and cover the cost of drive-offs have been ordered to compensate the former console operator and his fellow-worker wife more than $50,000 after a court found them accessorily liable for underpayments.
The FWO is prosecuting the operators of a Sydney restaurant for allegedly underpaying a skilled worker on a SubClass 457 visa by more than $150,000 while they maintained "overall control" of his bank account.
The FWO has launched a test case against the operator of a pop-up toy store, seeking to reverse the onus of proof for underpayments and rely for the first time on serious contraventions provisions that potentially expose the company and its director to 10 times the ordinary maximum penalties.
In a ruling criticising the practice of diplomats recruiting domestic workers from overseas, the FWC has ordered Iraq's consul-general to pay $20,000 to a Filipina live-in nanny dismissed after raising concerns about her entitlements.
A company director has been found personally liable for her company's adverse action when a visa worker was threatened with the sack for speaking to an FWO inspector.
The Federal Circuit Court has imposed a fine if almost $100,000 on a former Caltex franchisee who admitted falsifying wage records for migrant workers, prompting warnings that higher penalties are now possible.
