The Attorney-General's Department will open a consultation process in December on six of the outstanding recommendations in Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins' landmark Respect@Work report, but the Opposition says the timeline leaves no room for legislation ahead of the federal election, expected by May.
A former ETU official is suing over his expulsion from the union for credit card misuse and refusing to apologise for an alleged assault, claiming discrimination on the basis of his gambling addiction and that the matters had already been finalised under the branch's previous leadership.
The Federal Court has given a self-represented worker a chance re-plead a race discrimination case against CIMIC Group subsidiary UGL after painstaking analysis of his "discursive" statements of claim led to the bulk being struck out or summarily dismissed.
SafeWork NSW has charged Qantas over alleged discriminatory conduct against an OHS representative it stood down after he apparently advised colleagues not to clean planes arriving from China early last year due to COVID-19 concerns.
A recruitment company's former operations manager, who is claiming $20,000 for the hurt and humiliation flowing from her alleged discriminatory sacking due to her pregnancy, has won more time to pursue her claim, while her employer has failed in its bid for costs against her "neophyte" lawyer, after a court accepted that there had been "a comedy of errors" that fell well short of representative error.
The FWC has today launched a consultation process for its new anti-s-xual-harassment jurisdiction, which starts operating from November 11, while it has also published a benchbook on the regime.
The insights gained from the rapid shift to working from home during COVID-19 could lead to the adoption of a "genuine consultation" requirement under the Fair Work Act's "right to request" flexibility that might start "a conversation aimed at reaching a mutually suitable arrangement", according to a new paper by two leading IR academics.
In an "unusual" case against a senior HR officer and an operations manager accused of bullying an area manager who "over-reacted" to a restructure, the FWC says it will close the matter if all agree to a host of recommendations or it will seek more evidence to continue the case.
The FWC has refused to order a worker's general practitioner to hand over medical records as it considers her anti-bullying case, noting that even if the information is relevant, requiring it might have a "harmful impact" on her health and wellbeing.
