A FWC full bench has reinforced that a member did not expressly condemn using medicinal marijuana for pain management in a safety-critical role because it was not relevant to considering whether a council harshly sacked a worker who switched prescriptions to one containing THC.
The FWC has ordered former IR Minister and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten's alma mater Xavier College to pay a teacher $14,000 for his unfair dismissal, ruling it harsh because he had never held another job and his messy desk, late marking and poor interactions with his colleagues did not justify his axing after 21 years of service.
The FWC has found it "fanciful" to suggest that an employer might allow a HR professional to send extensive confidential information to his personal email address without authorisation, ruling his serious misconduct warranted dismissal.
A 63-year-old brothel receptionist summarily sacked via an intermediary after 15 years of "loyal" service in the "happy little family" workplace will receive near-maximum compensation, after a FWC ruling.
A FWC full bench has emphatically quashed a deputy president's decision to bin a worker's unfair dismissal application with five hours' notice just two days before Christmas, finding he misapplied the Commission's powers and "misapprehended" the facts.
A property manager who returned home to down scotch and cokes with her sister following a panic attack during her working time has won $9,000 compensation, after the FWC found her real estate agent employer failed to establish that the hours-long drinking session coincided with her remotely accessing its IT system and deleting and forwarding her emails and other documents.
The FWC has found a top sales operator made redundant the day before her parental leave started was in fact unfairly dismissed, with her employer apparently transferring into her role its lowest performer "by a significant margin".
The FWC has upheld the sacking of an employee who worked outside the scope of her role - potentially exposing her employer to liability - despite "defects" in the employer's processes.
The FWC has found employer unfairly dismissed a worker when it cut his shifts after he took up work at a competing branch of the same franchise, because it wanted workers committed to the "awesomeness" of the business.
A mining truck driver's mobile phone use, detected by an infra-red driver alertness system, justified her dismissal, after what the FWC deemed to be a fair investigation process.