Courts page 4 of 93

A security company has been ordered to pay $80,000 to a former employee assaulted by current All-Australian AFL captain Toby Greene nearly a decade ago, a court finding that he could have claimed insurance for "permanent disablement" but for the employer failing to pay his superannuation on time.

A judge has declined to bundle together an employer's various workplace breaches in ordering it to pay $163,000 in fines to a former worker for stripping his severance pay of more than 500 accumulated annual leave hours.

In what a leading labour law academic describes as a "victory for common sense", a full court has quashed a ruling that union officials cannot use their right to enter premises for discussions with members to gather signatures on petitions or "secure a commitment to a particular course of action in the future".

In a rare decision exploring the statutory definition of "retirement age", a judge has determined that it is the age at which a person qualifies for the pension, rather than when they can access superannuation.

A former Indian High Commissioner who paid a live-in domestic worker $9 a day to keep his eight-bedroom Canberra home, after he arranged for her "posting" in Australia for the "reception and entertainment of guests", has been ordered to pay more than $130,000 compensation.

Optus has again failed to overturn a finding that underpaying workers' long service leave entitlements when they leave might count as a continuing offence under Victorian law, clearing the way for the State's Wage Inspectorate to pursue daily fines that could run into millions for the period before the telco rectified the alleged issue.

Former IR barrister Yaseen Shariff has told a ceremony welcoming him to the Federal Court how during his childhood in India his grandmother urged him to adopt the "dogged" character of Australian cricket captain Allan Border, while the gathering learned how he came to be known among chamber colleagues as "The Fox".

In a matter closely examining when building workers can down tools in response to potential safety risks, a court has found that two union officials breached workplace laws when involved in effectively shutting down a major construction site over concerns about a fire hydrant and a belligerent project manager said to pose a "psycho-social hazard".

A judge has lamented the shortage of "common sense" on display in a case in which a union contends a government agency breached its agreement's secure jobs and consultation provisions when it engaged a roadworks contractor.

In a significant ruling on agreement coverage, a full Federal Court has found that two Catholic school teachers are entitled to pay rises contained in new deals despite resigning before they took effect.