Australia

Authors: Emma Pritchard and Maria Markoulli In March 2020, the Australian Human Rights Commission (Australia’s national human rights institution) published its Respect@Work Report, making 55 recommendations to the Commonwealth Government (as well as states and territories, employers and industry groups) to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace. The focus of many of the […]

Authors: Jenny Inness and Justin Pen The Victorian Supreme Court has held that time limits under the Limitation of Actions Act 1958 (Vic) (“LOA Act”) do not apply to claims based on breaches of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 (Vic) (“EEO Act”) (the state of Victoria’s chief anti-discrimination legislation), such that there is no strict […]

Author: Justin Pen The High Court of Australia has clarified the proper approach to be taken when determining if a worker has been engaged as an ‘employee’ or an ‘independent contractor’, in cases where the parties’ contractual arrangements are wholly in writing. In Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union v Personnel Contracting Pty Ltd […]

Authors: Amy Zhang and Justin Pen In a broad case challenging the dismissal of two union employees and elected officials from their employment with the Construction & General Division of the Construction, Forestry, Mining, Maritime and Energy Union (“CFMMEU”), the Federal Court of Australia (Perram J) has observed that a ‘dismissal’ for the purposes of […]