A worker who was bullied and called a "s-x offender" by colleagues, after being charged with historical abuse offences, has been awarded compensation for a psychological injury, with a commission hearing the bullying included being excluded from Christmas functions, and dismissing the employer's reasonable action defence.
The Fair Work Commission has declined to make orders in a rare decision from its stop-s-xual-harassment jurisdiction, but hinted that sending "vile" text messages to colleagues could attract such an order.
A commission has cautioned that society's "significantly raised" bar for what constitutes consent for physical interactions is "even higher" in work-related environments, in upholding the summary dismissal of a worker for inappropriately touching a colleague.
An appeals commission has upheld a decision in favour of a worker who suffered a psychological injury from her employer's initial communications on a COVID-19 vaccine mandate. It rejected the employer's reasonable disciplinary action defence on the basis that the worker was injured before this action occurred.
Increasing conflict between workers and employers, over getting teams back into the office, means it is more important than ever for organisations to invest in "happy" workplaces, a workplace change specialist says.
A workplace manager did not bully a worker, but their employer dealt with the worker's grievances "clumsily", allowing misconstrued interactions to build up to a point where the mental health of both employees was affected, a commission has found.
A full supreme court has ruled on who bears the onus of proving whether an injury was caused by reasonable management action, in a case involving a performance-managed worker forced to record all his movements in a spreadsheet.
A worker who claims his schizophrenia was exacerbated by workplace bullying and harassment has been denied compensation, with a commission accepting the exacerbation was probably caused by a medical error.
A "critical and insensitive" manager who routinely swore at his subordinates in an attempt to motivate them to meet purported "German demands" has lost his adverse action case, with a court finding his behaviour warranted instant dismissal and he wasn't the victim of WHS breaches.
