A company director has been convicted and fined for a string of "disturbing" acts of bullying against two apprentices, including at a work Christmas party. A court found his company's safety failings were solely attributable to him.
The efforts, or lack thereof, of employers to comply with their positive duty to proactively prevent s-xual harassment will be actively scrutinised by at least one more regulator from today, with the Australian Human Rights Commission's new powers taking effect.
A WHS regulator will enforce the utilisation of risk assessments for psychosocial hazards in psychologically dangerous workplaces, under one of 18 recommendations from a parliamentary inquiry into NSW's workers' compensation system.
A worker in a senior government-funded position was not bullied when she was allegedly told to remove political LinkedIn posts, but unauthorised demands that she step down were unreasonable, a commission has found in an anti-bullying case.
The Federal Government has introduced the "final legislative reform" driven by recommendations from the landmark Respect@Work report, with a Bill removing a deterrent to workers bringing s-xual harassment claims.
A tribunal has applied a 14-fold increase to the damages awarded to a worker who was psychologically injured by her manager making "vulgar" remarks about her body, and making "repeated physical contact" with her.
A commission has recommended a worker be provided with "self-awareness" and "conflict avoidance" training, finding a "shared language" between him and his supervisors could have prevented most of the 40 or so bullying allegations he raised in his stop-bullying bid.
An employer has been ordered to pay more than $268,000 in damages and compensation to a harassed and victimised worker, with a court rejecting its claim its director's overtures towards the worker, who developed a psychiatric injury, were not s-xual in nature.
A worker's act of sharing offensive material with a group of colleagues on social media involved "abject stupidity", but his conduct was not sufficiently connected to his employment to warrant his dismissal, a Fair Work Commission full bench has found.