Employment

The Fair Work Commission has ordered a Bendigo Bank worker to come into the office two days a week, saying he was “only concerned about himself” in seeking to work from home full time.

A commercial leader at engineering and construction company Laing O’Rourke was unfairly dismissed over false claims he was offensive and aggressive towards Stayz hosts who complained about a late night work party, a judge has found.

An underpayments class action brought by postgraduate research candidates at the University of Sydney is facing another summary dismissal bid from the federal government, as the university foreshadows a novel argument that the group members are not employees.

The collapsed companies behind dumpling chain Din Tai Fung have been hit with over $3.8 million in penalties after a judge found they engaged in a “a calculated scheme to rob employees of their hard-earned wages and deceive the authorities”.

The allowance for genuine redundancies is “not absolute” and employers need to consider measures to redeploy workers, including retraining, an appeals court has said in an unfair dismissal case involving 22 mining workers.

Workplace health and safety lawyer Jane Hall is the newest addition to Holding Redlich, boosting the firm’s regulatory expertise.

The former head of legal for the West Gate Tunnel project has sued toll road operator Transurban, alleging she was made redundant after complaining about “a culture of fear and intimidation” on the project.

Convenience store operator On The Run will backpay $2.3 million in annual leave entitlements to 1,524 full and part-time employees — mostly console operators and roadhouse attendants working in South Australia. 

PricewaterhouseCoopers has been sued by an employee who alleges the accounting firm is vicariously liable for an alleged sexual assault by a co-worker after an end-of-financial-year work party.

A judge has slapped the University of Melbourne with a $74,590 penalty for taking adverse action against two casual academics to prevent them from claiming payment for extra hours worked.