The FWC has highlighted the additional credibility provided when employers test for drugs in accordance with the Australian Standard, in upholding a multinational mining company's sacking of a marijuana smoker who breached its zero tolerance policy.
A senior FWC member has upheld the sacking of an underground mineworker who tested positive for THC and continued to have elevated levels of the drug in his system 22 days later, finding it the "only course of action open" to the employer.
The FWC has upheld a building company's sacking of a safety officer who insisted his job was limited to an advisory capacity despite repeated warnings that he was to rigorously enforce safety across sites.
The FWC has found a vessel operator's decision to sack an experienced captain for breaching its zero-tolerance alcohol policy was harsh in the circumstances, arguing that it bore some responsibility for unresolved matters that affected his mental health and could have imposed less punitive penalties.
The FWC has accepted an employer's argument that the "paramount" importance it placed on OHS justified its sacking of a long-serving employee with an "unblemished history" who recorded more than twice the workplace blood alcohol limit after drinking four glasses of red wine the previous evening.
The Fair Work Commission has emphasised that employers conducting drug tests are not complying with best practice if their managers take samples from employees they directly manage.
The FWC has found it reasonable for Coles Group Supply Chain Pty Ltd to dismiss a worker who tested positive to cannabis but claimed to have consumed it outside what he believed to be the "window of detection".
FWC accepts six-minutes-late dismissal claim; Creative crane driver fails to win job back; FWC member showed no real or apparent bias, says bench; and Tribunal douses smoker's bid to win job back.
The FWC has made an indemnity costs order of more than $18,000 against a former Toll Holdings employee who built his unfair dismissal claim "almost exclusively" on a lie and a fabricated drug test result.
