FWC Targets Individuals in New Sexual Harassment Compensation Orders

Added: 2026-05-22

[00:00:05]Good day, Kim here. Hi, I'm very well.

[00:00:06]It's nice to be back.

[00:00:07]>> Yeah, good to have you back.

[00:00:09]>> [laughter] >> Sorry for last week, everyone. It was very good. I saw it, it was like Look, we've got a couple of things we want to talk about. We've had our second sexual harassment stop order compensation come fascinating judge Vest's decision, which I think I may have been critical of that judge in the past, but I like this judgment. I think it's really lucid and helpful.

[00:00:30]Um the world's chaotic at the moment, isn't it? When we we we talk about recessionary pressures, but I don't think we've ever been busier. Mhm. It's amazing. Yeah, which is good for us.

[00:00:39]Thank you very much for helping us. But it is interesting how much work is going, particularly in the psychological hazards area.

[00:00:47]How suddenly the dial has turned and people are engaging, people are talking to us, we're out there presenting and stuff. So, really interesting. But what I thought we might do is jump onto the first case, which is an abandonment case of Hug and Donato Airport.

[00:01:01]Kim, interesting case because we have a person who management weren't happy with.

[00:01:08]They said, "You can go home early." Mhm.

[00:01:10]Didn't really contact them again, and 2 weeks later sent a letter saying, "Where are you?"

[00:01:14]>> Mhm.

[00:01:15]Um all good things to ask.

[00:01:17]>> Mhm.

[00:01:18]Couple of other facts, tell me some of the other stuff.

[00:01:20]>> he um made some complaints about employee conduct, and then they counter complained that he was spreading rumors about them. So, they just sent him home early one shift and said, "You go home."

[00:01:30]And I think he was so hurt by it that he just didn't engage with the employer after that when they were contacting him for a couple of weeks. And so, after that, HR sent him a letter saying, "If you don't respond to our letter, we will treat it as a resignation and abandonment of employment." And so, he brought a claim in the Fair Work Commission as a result, and they argued that he was just not dismissed. Yeah, so that's right. And but the problem with the letter that they sent out is that they said your employment will be terminated. So, when someone abandons, it is under the Fair Work Act a termination at the employees behest, not the employers. So, it is a jurisdictional argument.

[00:02:11]>> Yeah.

[00:02:11]And there wasn't a lot in this case cuz there was clearly some contention that sat between them. And although the commissioner got captured by that dispute, if they had have sent the right letter, he had nowhere to go. You would have to accept abandonment. And to do that, [clears throat] and I That's why I'm raising this is if I had responded to you regularly when you seek response and you go through all the channels to try and communicate, they failed to do it. That is evidence of abandonment. That is a failure to engage with the the employer and they are employed to be at work, okay? So, it is a basis for abandonment. It's greater than 3 days, which is the traditional test.

[00:02:46]>> Yeah.

[00:02:46]But you must then use the language of the statute, which is you would be ending your employment.

[00:02:53]>> Mhm. You would be the termination would be by you, not us, and we will accept that termination. And they failed to do it. So, they lost. Had they used the right words, they wouldn't have been the problem.

[00:03:05]>> I I We're going to deal with a case which I'm not so happy with. Um Yeah, I don't agree with this decision. I'm glad you said that.

[00:03:11]>> Marion Watt Pack, which sits which sits at odds with the really good decision in Fago and um Bowring.

[00:03:19]Talk a bit about the the facts, Kim, on this one.

[00:03:22]>> we've got a 67-year-old manager. Good age, by the way. Can I just say that?

[00:03:27]Good age.

[00:03:28]He [laughter] um he wanted to condense his four five working days into four, but also said the main reason I want to do that is so that I can pursue some creative writing and create a new income stream for me in my retirement. But he gave no indication of when he might be retiring.

[00:03:47]Um and the employer rejected his It was a flexible work arrangement and that was rejected by the employer on reasonable business grounds that we had to redistribute your duties.

[00:03:58]Um and so he's brought an application to the Fair Work Commission and they found in his favor. And can I just say it's nonsense because the the Boeing decision quite rightly said, "Look, being over 55, although it's one of the trigger points, must have a nexus with the nature of flexible work." And to do that, if you were saying, "Look, I'm transitioning," you must have a transition plan. And because how can a business respond a business case when it doesn't know what you're going to do?

[00:04:26]So, you're doing this for a few days and then what are you going to do and when's it going to happen and what planning have we got to do?

[00:04:32]Imagine if everyone said, "Oh, look, we all just want to go and work 4 days cuz I'm over 55."

[00:04:37]Well, a business can't run like that.

[00:04:39]So, I don't think this is a good decision and can I just say to you, if I was doing business reasons and when this happens, and remember our demographic is that over 50% of their workers are 45 or older. So, we're going to see more of it. Is to say to them, "Look, let's talk about what the transition planning is so we have something to respond to to see whether it's reasonable." So, not a great decision, but it just shows you the diversity of decisions that are coming.

[00:05:06]And for us, what we're saying is if you're a business, you got to push back and say, "What's the plan?"

[00:05:12]All right, Murphy um Murphy and Aspen Kim I don't know how many cases you get through where people are being performance managed, put in sick leave, and then end up being terminated. And everybody goes, "Oh my I'm so worried about them being on sick leave. What should I do?" And you and I go, "Well, you quarantine the decision maker to deal with the performance management you keep away from the other knowledge that sits there so that they are only dealing with this issue cuz the test under general protections is the reverse onus sits upon the decision maker subjectively to be making decisions where the dominant purpose doesn't relate to the protected attribute.

[00:05:50]>> [clears throat] >> And that's what happened in this case.

[00:05:52]When you talked about the facts, but I just want to get through what the law is because I think if this is again a really good decision, but really good business management that allowed this.

[00:06:00]Yeah. So, the employee, um well, the employer had addressed performance issues with the employee prior to him taking a period of sick leave. Um he failed to cover rostered shifts when he was rostered on and didn't show up. Um he made I'll other staff made complaints about him bullying them and humiliating them, undermining them. There were general performance concerns, and when they addressed these with him, he got quite aggressive in the meeting, and then he took a period of sick leave. Then, when they terminated him when he returned to work, he brought a general protections claim and it said the obvious, you terminated me cuz I took the sick leave.

[00:06:37]But, they are able to demonstrate very clearly with the reverse onus that the sole reason for terminating him was the performance concern.

[00:06:44]>> Yeah. And I can I just say this shows the importance of documents? Mhm. Okay?

[00:06:47]So, if I'm having a chat with you, I take a contemporaneous note.

[00:06:50]>> Yeah.

[00:06:51]Contemporaneous note, exception to the hearsay rule, evidence of the truth. I take my note. I make sure that I email them back straight afterwards, contemporaneous record. I build up a layer of truth about what I'm saying.

[00:07:03]So, when I make a decision, and I can say, "Look, these issues are raised, these were your responses." When he was aggressive, it's very unhelpful you to be rude and aggressive. We don't accept that type of behavior. You're failing to Building that documentary pathway. I'm not saying huge documents, just compelling evidence of truth that occurred along the way cuz if you don't have those, this isn't a safe place. But, you've got to address the performance concerns as they arise. And that's probably the bigger issue for us. Can I just say we were talking about this before we came on, and you said and I'm and I'm not quoting, but the good nature of employers is they're inclined to allow bad to continue >> Yeah. it blows up.

[00:07:42]And then it's always mixed. It's mixed with mental health issues. It's mixed with sick leave.

[00:07:47]>> Yeah. So suddenly it's cloudy and it's hard for you to be able to prove, "No, I was definitely doing it because of this." Move quickly.

[00:07:54]>> Mhm. Mhm. Yeah. No good.

[00:07:56]Good tells you what's bad. Respond immediately.

[00:08:00]Well, the next case is a coronial inquiry and can I just say before we start this does deal with someone taking their lives. So please be aware that this is what the story is about. We won't be detailing how I We're just going to talk about the facts.

[00:08:12]>> Mhm. What I would say is one of the problems in coronial inquiries into things that have a workplace orientation is um with the greatest respect to coroners, they're often not informed of the workplace law that sits behind it.

[00:08:25]>> Mhm. And what comes out of these findings is a lack of understanding or knowledge of workplace law because coroners are simply to find that a death occurred and how the death occurred.

[00:08:35]That's That's their jurisdiction. It's very limited. Mhm.

[00:08:38]Um So this was a This was a case about I'm not quite sure she was a sales assistant >> Sales assistant had been injured at work. Then when she returned to work on light duties, um she complained that other staff didn't assist her, ridiculed her for not being able to do her full job. Um and just made life Oh, and were ignoring her at work as well and just made her life quite difficult. Um but when she complained to HR, they didn't undertake an investigation.

[00:09:08]And and they actually did Of course, they did something which if you ever think of doing this, just remember I will find you and I will kill you, okay? But what they did is let's go through a facilitation process and put the five or six people in a room with you to try and fix it.

[00:09:22]>> Yeah. So a person's complaining of being bullied and in an uncontrolled environment, you put everybody in the room with her to try and heal it.

[00:09:30]Not surprisingly, that harmed her further. And her Her concerns were that HR were not taking her seriously.

[00:09:37]And HR's response was, "Well, there's a lack of particularity. We can't investigate something This is a real vibe type thing. We're trying to fix the vibe." So, one of the things and the coroner made some scathing findings about the good guys in this, including their investigative failings.

[00:09:53]Um but it wasn't a terribly It was rather emotive set of findings. And And it was justified if we had have gone back to what the law was.

[00:10:02]The obligation under safety law not mentioned. The obligation under safety law was when a person says they're unsafe at work, she'd done that, that you have an obligation to mitigate or prevent harm to her.

[00:10:16]And the method of determining the level of risk of that harm is an investigation.

[00:10:20]>> Mhm.

[00:10:20]>> And the fact that initially someone says, "Well, this is how they behave, but doesn't give me a date or a time," doesn't mean you can walk away. Your job then is to interrogate down and to find out on this date people did this on this date so that you get the particularity, which [clears throat] does allow a proper investigation. So, nearly every way the HR department, the good guys, tried to collapse this down, prevent the problem from getting further, and failed to take the action they need. So, the coroner was right.

[00:10:48]>> Yeah.

[00:10:49]But the workplace law was missed. This is a safety-based issue. Safety says, "What is the risk? Identify the hazards.

[00:10:55]What are the risks?" They failed to identify the hazards, determine the risks, so they couldn't have controlled it.

[00:10:59]>> Mhm.

[00:11:00]And the method by which they should have done that was a very deliberate investigative process with someone who gave her comfort to allow her to be clear and to test what she was doing.

[00:11:10]And none of that happened. It's very sad, you know, cuz at the end of the day Yeah. the pain this woman suffered led to a loss of life. And I guess we all need to hear that story because if you actually don't listen to people who are being harmed at work, that's what you do.

[00:11:26]Yeah.

[00:11:27]All right. Um so, a sad case. I'm afraid we've got a whole lot of them today.

[00:11:32]>> do. Yeah, I know. This We see the worst of it, don't we? I do. I I keep saying that I live as a pathologist. I see what see everything after it's gone wrong.

[00:11:40]>> Yeah. But the Newcrest case that we're going to talk about is a is a terrific safety case where Newcrest end up um getting a fine for $750,000.

[00:11:50]But it was about a very high-risk activity that was being undertaken.

[00:11:54]Newcrest had beautiful policies and procedures describing what should occur.

[00:11:58]But the history revealed normalization of wrong behavior, a condonation of of wrong behavior in this risk-based activity.

[00:12:06]>> Well, the their system of um their safety system was all dependent on worker compliance with it. And it didn't happen. And they knew it didn't happen, and they still didn't put any other controls around it. Yeah. And so look, when we look at what is a safety system, and I'm sorry to go sideways a bit, but safety system has six elements. What is the plan? Okay, so here in their activity was what is the plan around managing this risk? This was a repeated risk.

[00:12:29]What is the process? Okay, okay, we've got a process. They've got good policies and procedures. Now, that's a If you don't act on them, that's just a backbone of liability because that shows you failed reasonable practical when you don't do it. What's the training and competence? Where is the evidence that people are competent to do it? Not there.

[00:12:46]In relation to supervision, is the supervisor, the people leading this, know the plan, know the policy, satisfied the people are doing it and competent, ensuring it's occurring? Not here.

[00:12:57]Is there a monitoring system that determines whether it is working and whether there's a better way to do it, to reiterate and get better? Not here.

[00:13:04]And what is the reporting system saying about the sufficiency of the system and You You see policies are one part of six.

[00:13:13]And we keep thinking that it's a defense, that it stops. Paper doesn't stop people being harmed and hurt. It is when the paper is understandable. Now, in this case, modern safety theory is if people are doing high-risk activity, and we'll deal with this again in the next case, they must have a working living knowledge of what to do as they go towards they can't have to go to a policy they don't have to go to a policy. They know the four or five things they must do because in high risk activity it's all too late to say go and look at the policy. They must have this living competence and it forms two things. One, they must have access to the knowledge and must be available to them. So in other words, the knowledge must exist but it might be on their mobile phone if they're out and out in a remote place they can press and go doing this, what do I do?

[00:14:02]It must be in a language they can read and understand. So it's accessibility and availability and then demonstrated competence and without it we end up in terrible place like this.

[00:14:12]Well, that's probably a a difficult segue when we we Well, this next one's even worse, isn't it? Well, we we brought this case to you last time which is the mastermind fatality with a $7 million industrial manslaughter but we said we didn't have the published decision.

[00:14:28]And boy, we've got it now and Kim it's devastating, isn't it? As I as I read through the published decision. So what happened is this mine had been closed for a while, they reopened it, they got some geotechnical advisers to work out how you would go back to work in the area that was inherently dangerous >> to make the roof stable.

[00:14:45]>> Yeah, make the roof stable.

[00:14:46]They had a plan, they consulted on the plan, they had a thorough risk assessment and they started doing it.

[00:14:51]They decided to change that and do a simpler thing without any risk assessment, without any geotechnical support to say that it was a safe thing to do. So this underground and a person's working in this space and they did no consult no proper consultation and as a result of this this man got crushed.

[00:15:08]>> Yeah.

[00:15:09]When you hear that, you understand what the tariff of industrial manslaughter why it's there. So this is a such a want of care.

[00:15:18]But you see deliberate decisions that were made which created risk which a person charged knowing the level of inherent danger this person was faced, is utterly careless to that person. So, you can see why this is up this was a $10 million maximum. So, if we're looking in Victoria with $25 million, had this happened in Victoria, we're looking at sort of $20 million exposure.

[00:15:39]You can see exactly how the sentencing tariff works. Here, in this case, you went from a place of knowledge of safety that everyone understood, and you took that away probably for economic circumstances, but I that's not part of what the case talks about. You replace it with something which doesn't have any of the protective mechanisms which are necessary to utilize it, knowing that people will be working in that place of danger.

[00:16:04]You get what you deserve. Yeah, so fascinating case and great decision from Judge Clark on that one.

[00:16:12]All righty. Workers comp claim. We've got a lot on today. I'm sorry.

[00:16:16]>> [laughter] >> We just We are racing through them a bit. The Spaceman Tamworth Regional Council is a is a great story of when someone with a particular level of capacity is transferred into a role and what happens next. So, let's talk about it because this is not only a reasonable management case, in fact it's sort of not in a way, although it's cast that way.

[00:16:35]>> That's what the employer relied on, so >> And this is New South Wales No, Tamworth is Yeah, New South Wales. Yeah, so New South Wales case and it really juxtaposes the current system, the 11A versus what Yeah, what what will happen going forward. So, over here Uh so, we have employee for a council had a respiratory condition which they knew about, and then they wanted to transfer him to another role, more rigorous activity, um faster pace working environment, different start times, less regularity, all that sort of thing. Um He Sorry.

[00:17:11]>> co-workers Thank you. I went blank.

[00:17:15]>> [laughter] >> We've been doing this for long time, as you've probably guessed.

[00:17:19]His co-workers expressed a level of frustration because he couldn't work at the same pace that they could, and he ended up lodging a work cover claim for psychological injury. And the employer rejected or denied the claim on the basis that it was reasonable management action based it on the transfer. Yeah.

[00:17:35]And the decision of the commission was, no. Um, you should have assessed him assessed his um appropriateness for the transfer based on the if he was fit to do the role and you didn't do that. So, that wasn't reasonable. And the other part of it was that the frustration of his colleagues which caused his psychological injury wasn't part of reasonable management action. Yeah, so if we look at if we took that to Victoria with the change of legislation, the claim would be rejected. Okay? Now, you tell me why it'd be rejected. You sprung that on me, Andrew. I did, but it would be rejected [laughter] because it's part of personal relationships that exist.

[00:18:12]>> Oh, usual and typical. Yeah. Oh, no, I don't agree. You don't agree?

[00:18:16]>> No. Not not if he's he's not inherently fit for the role because of his medical condition. I think that's the really the key issue here.

[00:18:23]>> Yeah, yeah, okay. And in New South Wales, I've expanded the definition of reasonable management action to if someone has a perception or expectation of management action which we have here in Victoria. Yeah. But in this case, um that wouldn't wash either because it was the the psychological injury was caused by the level of frustration caused by his colleagues.

[00:18:43]>> That's great.

[00:18:43]>> think he would be So, it'd be successful now in Victoria and in the future in New South Wales as well. You think yeah, okay. Interesting, isn't it, because I put this is me put this case in cuz I think it's fascinating that we we forget that as we move people between jobs, even in a law firm, if I take someone from an associate to a senior associate, the responsibilities and the delivery at that higher level are very significant, but we just assume on the pathway to progress that people make it. You know, they've got the right billings, they've got all that sort of stuff. But, we don't stop and assess the person and say, "Look, can they do it?"

[00:19:21]In physic in the physical world and the psychological world, sometimes as we move people, we might expose people to significantly more difficult clients. So, you know, they might suddenly be in front of people who are not easy to deal with or they may >> have any clients like that. No, we have no clients like that.

[00:19:38]But, my point about it is we forget to do the assessment as we change a role.

[00:19:42]Now, it's very easy in this physical assessment process. You place a person with respiratory issues into a role where they have to work harder, it's unlikely they can do it.

[00:19:51]So, they were lucky they were lucky they didn't get a worker's comp claim for the physical part of it to be perfectly honest. Um Could well have aggravated it.

[00:19:59]>> Yeah, so but please remember as you're going to move some, particularly where there's a known disability, you must reassess a person before you move them.

[00:20:06]And then discrimination law requires you to make appropriate adjustments. And that didn't happen either. So, really interesting case.

[00:20:15]Okay, why don't we jump over to main topic. the main topic.

[00:20:19]What a discussion this one is. This is This is a guy who worked inside a a store in Storage King. Yep.

[00:20:28]His sexual orientation is not an issue in this. So, you're not told whether he's gay or not gay, but a contractor started off teasing him about being gay for whatever reason. And then joined in with a customer to continue this focus upon him in being gay and saying harmful and destructive and it hurt this guy. Oh, terrible things.

[00:20:48]Yeah. So, he originally joined the employer and then decided not to join the employer cuz the employer had no knowledge of what was occurring or a method of prevention, but we don't get a lot of detail around that part of it.

[00:20:58]But, what he did is he brought an order and this shows the breadth of this jurisdiction, just like the bullying jurisdiction.

[00:21:04]>> This is the prohibiting sexual harassment at work Yeah, yeah.

[00:21:07]>> provision in the Fair Work Act. Just like the bullying one, except this one has a compensation arm to it these days.

[00:21:13]Against a customer and against a contractor.

[00:21:17]And Vester found their behavior was appalling. As Judge Vester, sorry, found their and ordered 45,000 of 90,000 between two of them to be shared and then 13,000 individually to each person.

[00:21:31]Really interesting decision cuz you start to understand the bullying jurisdiction has never been used like this. Okay?

[00:21:38]But it But it can be. It can be against people who are non-employees. You can do it. So, what do I think this tells us? One, we now know where the tariff sits.

[00:21:48]Non-touch sexual harassment, irrespective sexual orientation, which causes harm, sits in the middle of the $100,000 threshold, sits in the middle.

[00:21:58]That's good to know, isn't it?

[00:22:00]Because it says that this jurisdiction is not designed for very very dangerous sexual harassment because we know in sexual harassment land that's hundreds of thousands of dollars. But it does show you that it's being taken incredibly seriously. So, I thought a really fascinating decision. This doesn't prevent a person from bringing workers compensation claim as well, but we do know you do need to pick your jurisdiction around sexual harassment if it's on the same group of facts. We dealt with that case a couple of weeks ago.

[00:22:29]Okay, why don't we go on to the case study?

[00:22:32]Kev was hurt. He felt that his boss, Connie, was cold and indifferent. He had spoken to her about his child's special needs and his own health issues, but instead of showing compassion, she simply asked what support he needed.

[00:22:45]What Kev really needed was understanding. Connie appeared emotionally cold and other people had noticed it as well.

[00:22:52]There may have been many explanations for her behavior, but she was not sharing any of them.

[00:22:57]Tired, vulnerable, and sad, Kevin approached Connie. She was busy and her actions suggested that he was a nuisance. However, he had practiced what he needed to say, built up the courage to speak, and knew it was the right thing to do.

[00:23:11]Despite Connie staring at her screen, he began speaking.

[00:23:15]He said, "Connie, I'm struggling. Alf, the leading hand, is rude, mocks my limp, and gives me work below my classification. He called me the the other day. I don't feel safe coming to work. I need you as our foreman to help me. My life is hard enough without the harm Alf is causing."

[00:23:32]Connie, distracted and disinterested, muttered, "Kev, you need to get a grip.

[00:23:36]He's your boss. Stop looking for issues to complain about and just do the job.

[00:23:40]He, like me, is tired of your excuses."

[00:23:43]Kev was shocked. He left work.

[00:23:46]Um He Sorry, he felt lost. He left the office and caught a bus home and made an appointment to see his doctor. However, seeing a doctor was not easy in Warburton because the waiting list was long. He was given an appointment in 2 weeks' time.

[00:24:00]The next morning, the phone rang. It was work. He did not answer because the name on the screen was Connie. He did not feel safe speaking to her. Later, he sent a text message asking her not to call him on his personal phone. He explained that he was hurt, unwell, and scared of her.

[00:24:15]The next day, he received an email on his work account from Connie stating that he had an obligation to provide evidence of his illness, otherwise she would treat his absence as abandonment of employment. Kev felt bullied and ignored.

[00:24:30]And he ignored the email. He switched off his computer. 3 days later, Connie sent another email stating that she had not heard from him for 3 days and that unless she received appropriate evidence supporting personal leave, she would assume he had abandoned his employment.

[00:24:44]Shortly after the email was sent, Nikki, a friend from work, dropped by to see Kev. She told him that they were going to sack him if he did not respond. Kev explained that Connie was bullying him and that he did did feel safe responding and that he had a appointment the following week, and he would provide a medical certificate then.

[00:25:01]Nikki told Connie, who simply laughed and said, "He just doesn't want to come back." The next day, Connie sent Kev a termination letter stating that he'd abandoned his employment.

[00:25:12]Kev then made an application to the Fair Work Commission alleging that he'd been wrongfully terminated.

[00:25:17]Connie responded with a jurisdictional argument claiming that Kev had not been terminated by his employer. Kev, that's interesting, wasn't it? That was after half a bottle of red wine. That's why it was a bit long. I >> [laughter] >> often use the word Kev.

[00:25:32]I nearly laughed at that one.

[00:25:34]I shouldn't. I've never used it to anyone.

[00:25:36]>> [snorts] >> Okay, what claim could Kev bring in the Fair Work Commission? So, he's got two obvious ones, hasn't he? He's got a discrimination, uh sorry, general protections and unfair dismissal. Um but, he's also raised a number of protected attributes of caring, disability, a whole lot of other stuff.

[00:25:50]So, there's also a discrimination claim lurking in the background. And stop bullying. Stop bullying? Yeah, yeah, good, good, good. So, it's amazing, isn't it? When you get going in this We're lucky we're not planning for us, aren't we? We get quite excited about this.

[00:26:04]But, I guess what part of the reason I'm raising this is as we go through the questions, it becomes really apparent that there are a number tools in an employee kit bag when they're treated wrongly.

[00:26:15]And it is wrong to think it's just going to be an unfair dismissal claim you can settle. Cuz that's not the case.

[00:26:20]Was Kev able to make a successful worker's compensation claim?

[00:26:23]>> Without a doubt. Without a doubt. In any jurisdiction, with any amendment, he was still going to win, wasn't he?

[00:26:29]Was Kev discriminated against, and if so, what was the protected attribute?

[00:26:32]Yeah, mainly the disability. So, disability, caring. Yeah, so there there are some pretty easy ones that are sitting out there. And for general protections, not as an attribute, but as a workplace right, clearly he's raised complaints. Okay?

[00:26:44]>> [snorts] >> Uh could Kev have brought a stop bullying order while he was still employed? We've addressed that.

[00:26:49]>> Yeah, and the the importance of that is after he's not employed he can't. Okay? Because it's stop bullying and stop sexual harassment is at work and if they're not at work and terminate, he can't bring it.

[00:27:00]>> Yes.

[00:27:01]Did Connie and the business breach workplace safety laws and if so, how and what charges could be pursued? So, the answer is really clear. Yes, they could.

[00:27:08]And if we just start with Connie because Connie's behavior is attributed to the organization. So, whatever I charge Connie with, I'm charging the organization.

[00:27:17]Did she do everything that was reasonably practical to provide a safe workplace? No, she created the hazards.

[00:27:22]They became high risk. She was aware of those risks. She did nothing to control.

[00:27:25]In fact, she did quite the opposite.

[00:27:27]So, personally what she has done is without doubt failed to exercise reasonable care to protect him. So, section 25 breach in Victoria and similar. So, personal liability is alive there. Connie's not an officer, so forget about that.

[00:27:43]Is her behavior so bad that it gets to reckless endangerment? That is, was she aware that there's a risk of serious harm and indifferent to it?

[00:27:51]So, the standard of care is there. An unsafe workplace, unsafe system. So, there's a lot of liability. It's not going very well. The next question is, did Connie's behavior lift to a level from breach of her primary duty to one of reckless endangerment?

[00:28:05]The two core elements of that is, did she did she appreciate or could she reasonably appreciate there was a risk of serious harm?

[00:28:12]I don't think it meets that threshold.

[00:28:14]The second part is, was she indifferent?

[00:28:15]Absolutely. But, it shows you with a little bit more meat on the bone, a little bit more harm that is obvious, that she would be in reckless endangerment territory. Even though at the moment there's no demonstrable illness, she would be.

[00:28:29]Well, Kim, it's been a lot on today.

[00:28:31]>> company? Oh, no, not the company. Didn't provide well, primary duty breach of care. Yeah, no, breach Sorry, that's what I said. Breach of primary duty for company. So. Sorry. See that. I wasn't listening, obviously. Forget about Forget about that last bit. We're saying goodbye again. All right. Well, thank you very much. We'll see you later.

[00:28:44]Cheers.

[00:28:45]>> Thanks, everyone. All right.