The downturn in the coal sector is making extraction companies the star turn at the Fair Work Commision. Helensburgh Coal Pty Ltd today faces seven unfair dismissal claims (Bondfield, Brophy, Duffy, Gilmore, Nixon, Webb and Wood).
October 5, 2015
The slowdown in the mining sector is manifested by the reappearance of Whitehaven Coal Mining Ltd in the Industrial Tribunal. Today it will defend four claims of unfair dismissal (Harris, Heath, Kingdom and Shephard). Other entities appearing in the Fair Work Commission today include: Vancouver Waste Services Pty Ltd (Head); Chevron Australia Pty Ltd (Hunter); Steggles Pty Ltd (Ponta); Doral Fused Materials Pty Ltd (Schmidt); Teys Australia Southern Pty Ltd (Chapman); Mink Fashion Pty Ltd (Geale); and Ausunion Property Investment Group Pty Ltd (Wang).
October 1, 2015
A man who was fired for a $23,000 phone bill was justifiably dismissed, the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) has ruled. The Mighty River Power employee racked up the charges on his work phone while on a three-week holiday in Sri Lanka earlier this year. The employee’s name is suppressed. “International roaming” charges made up $23,350 of the Spark bill, with just $6 spent on international calls and texts. Around 1.5GB of data was used. In New Zealand, a $29 plan would cover the same data usage. The data use was spread across a variety of apps, including iTunes, Facebook, Snapchat, Google, Amazon, Instagram, Gmail, Dropbox, and Akamai. Analysis showed the use was consistent rather than varied – suggesting it was due to “sync” usage rather than active internet browsing. When the employee returned to his job his boss confronted him about the charges, as well as the fact that he had returned a day later than expected, and had driven to work in a company car after only a few hours of sleep. He was dismissed and subsequently laid a complaint with the ERA. It could not be established that the man had received a warning text from Spark after $2486 of charges had been racked up. Spark noted the text message after Mighty River Power disputed the charges, but no proof of the text being sent could be found. It could be established that the man was generally aware of high charges for international data usage, and that he had received texts from Spark on entry to Australia and Sri Lanka warning him of the charges. The man also purchased a $5 sim card for his personal phone so he could make calls and texts while in the country. Whilst the ERA ruled that his dismissal was justified, the manner of the dismissal was ruled to have been unfair. The man was not given a fair chance to explain his bill, so the company was ordered to pay him $6000 in compensation for “loss of dignity and injury to his feelings”. The company’s counterclaim, which sought orders to make the man pay the bill himself, failed.
October 1, 2015
Principals Australia Institute will have its employment principles examined in the Fair Work Commission today, along with 23 other employers: Swan Hill Services Pty Ltd (Monck), AJM/Office Furniture Direct (Kiivas), James Cook University (Tibbey), Coca Cola Amatil (Aust) Pty Ltd (Pahnelas), National Training and Development (Flood), Green Home Green Planet Pty Ltd (Kanji), The Trust for Easy Unit Trust (Foster), Print Professionals Pty Ltd (Manolopoulos), Scope Vic (Evans), PFD (Meade), Transfield Services Sydney (Westrip/Wilson), Mt Cotton Constructions Pty Ltd (Cox), Rawdon Hill Constructions Pty Ltd (Castillo), Neil Hobbins Pty Limited (Green), Gradco Pty Ltd (Hipworth), Special Broadcasting Services Corporation (McIntyre), Mt Pleasant Stud Farm Pty Limited (McCormick), The Gardens Greyhound Racing Club Limited (Petrovski), Lenovo Professional Pty Ltd (Fartash), UAM Pty Ltd (Staynor), Quinns Rocks Sports Club Inc (Hikawai), Principals Australia Institute (Engelbrecht/Lewis-Appleck) and Antonelli Investments Pty Ltd (Smith).
September 30, 2015
Whitehaven Coal Mining Ltd is the star of the Fair Work Commission today with four ex-employees (Harris, Heath, Kingdom and Shephard) having a crack at mining some funds from the fossil fuel extractor. Twenty-three other entities will also appear in the Fair Work Commission today at the behest of ex-employees including: Santosheema Pty Ltd (Alexander), HCH (WA) Pty Ltd (Chitty), Whybin/TBWA Group (Asmar), Ladywood Clinic (Paterson-Gray), Grizzly Energy Services (Jordan), Roberts Limited (Pearson), SMS Rental (WA) Pty Ltd (Banam), Spa Beauty & Wellness Pty Ltd (Ferreira), Lanier Australia (Pender), Taxation Management Services Pty Ltd (Armstrong), Water Corporation (Kretchmar), Tidewater Marine Australia Pty Ltd (Lombardo), MMA Offshore Vessel Operations Pty Ltd (Milovale Masoe), FQM Australia Nickel Pty Ltd (Gonzalez), RePipe Pty Ltd (Dunne), Meridian Services (Chandler), PJ Event Decorators Pty Limited (Raymond), ALDI Stores (Pavlov) and ABBE Corrugated Pty Ltd (Ly).
September 29, 2015
The Australian Federal Police will be in the Fair Work Commission today to defend an s.739 dispute application (Van Dissel) before FW Deputy President Kovacic in Canberra. Other entities appearing today include: Boart Longyear (Waterworth), NTI Limited (Post), NTD Management Pty Ltd (Barber), Bradconn Pty Ltd (Hussey), Gladstone Area Water Board (Ellem), University of Canberra (Hoyle), Bank of Sydney Ltd (Repici), Metro (Singh), KDR Victoria Pty Ltd (Soares), United Facility Group Pty Ltd (Jurcevic), Johnson Meats (Carruthers), Shevron Industries Pty Ltd (Pagalia), McCain Foods (Aust) Pty Ltd (Bridges), Valued Independent People (Fraser), Peter John Vanderbeek & Kerry Lyn Vanderbeek (Kos), MDA National (O’Meara), Berala on the Park HR Pty Ltd (Camille), J.G Cleaning Contractors Pty Ltd (Hobson), Fujitsu Australia Ltd (Sharma), Andrew A and Tracy L Hall (Bernardi), EZKO Property Services (Aust) P/L (Vasilas) and FQM Australia Nickel Pty Ltd (Gonzalez).
September 28, 2015
The Fair Work Commission will hear fourteen claims of unfair dismissal, two of which emanate from the aged care sector (Australian Aged Care Group Pty Ltd (Pitts) and Uniting Care Wesley Adelaide Inc (Ha). The other applications to be heard today include: Preview Industries Australia Pty Ltd (Taarnby); ProSciTech Pty Ltd (Ohnesorge); Spotless Cleaning (Beniyamin); Jetta Express Pty Ltd (Shaba); Grant Andrew Burns Family Trust (Camenzuli); G8 Education (Drury); Cuddlepie Early Childhood Learning Centre (United Voice); Macquarie Group Services Australia Pty Ltd (Ross); Play Tennis World Pty Ltd (Backes); The Fire Company Pty Ltd (De Lima Oliveira Santos); Pickles Auctions (Rooney); Australian Taxation Office (Kathuria); and Coulter Vets P/L (Vavlitis)
September 25, 2015
Virgin Australia Airlines Pty Ltd is being accused by an ex-employee (Worthy) that the airline H.R. boffins have over reached. Other companies running defence of their employment practices today include: Gympie Regional Council (Billiau), Simpson Automotive (Dempster), Persuader Pty Ltd (Brizzi), Hella Australia Pty Ltd (Letts), ACE Audiology & Hearing (Allan), King of Smiles Pty Ltd ATF Bakare Family Trust (Harlow), Hoover Container Solutions Pty Ltd (Ramsay), Union Hydraulics Pty Ltd (Wallwork), West Wimmera Health Service (Lynch), ACE Operations Pty Ltd (Davies) and Microanalytix Pty Ltd (Pettitt).
