overview
studies
abusers
institutions
e-kids
e-workers
Aust law
cases 1
cases 2
cases 3
damages
responses
elsewhere
accounts
landmarks
related:
Australian
Law
Discrimination
|
Australian responses
This page considers Australian responses to bullying.
It covers -
termination
One response to bullying is to discipline, demote or fire
the bully.
That action reflects a concern for the well-being of the
organisation's employees. It also reflects criticisms
by courts and tribunals that employers failed to address
a bullying culture and tacitly endorsed the activity of
a bully.
As the preceding pages have indicated, bullying in schools
and workplaces on occasion clearly involves illegal action.
Bullying typically breaches corporate occupational health
& safety guidelines, detailed human resource manuals
or statements of workplace principles, cited for example
by Nikolich in Goldman Sachs JB Were Services Pty
Ltd v Nikolich [2007] FCAFC 120, discussed here.
Those breaches provide both a rationale for firing an
employee and a defence if the bully takes action against
the former employer for breach of the bully's own contract.
(Firing must, of course, be conducted properly).
Courts have sometimes gone beyond expectations that an
employer will counsel/discipline a bully as a means of
stopping abuse and have for example criticised an organisation
for failing to terminate a bully's employment. One example
is State of New South Wales v Gary Donald Jeffrey
& Ors [2000] NSWCA 171 (1 September 2000) here.
That is consistent with acceptance that employers may
validly terminate employment if that person has engaged
in bullying, eg -
- Jane
Owens v Whyalla Aged Care Incorporated [2007] AIRC
245 - here
- Spelleken
v Darling Downs Foods [2002] QIRComm 168 (10 October
2002)
- Graham
v BCC [2001] QIRComm 173; 168 QGIG 170 (10 October
2001) - here.
The
legitimacy of firing is evident in a range of cases.
In Karen Sinapi v Coles Supermarkets Australia Pty
Ltd [2008] AIRC
405 (14 May 2008) the Australian Industrial Relations
Commission found that Coles was justified in dismissing
store manager Karen Sinapi.
Ms Sinapi had been employed by Coles for 24 years, including
service at the retailer's Kingsbury store. An investigation
of her conduct followed allegations that she had verbally
abused a Kraft Foods representative and expelled her from
the store, had verbally abused another Coles employee
when upset about that person's placement of stock, had
grabbed that employee by the ponytail and pulled her along
an aisle, and engaged in inappropriate behaviour with
a male employee (recorded by a security video camera).
Coles investigated the behaviour, provided Ms Sinapi was
provided with the recording as part of the investigation
and had an opportunity to respond to the allegations.
She was later dismissed for bullying, with 4 weeks pay
in lieu of notice.
She subsequently claimed under the Workplace Relations
Act 1996 (Cth) she had been unfairly dismissed on
the basis that there was no valid reason to terminate
her employment and that Coles had not considered the length
of her service or the impact of the dismissal.
The Commission disagreed, finding that that there were
"sound, defensible and well founded" reasons
for dismissal and that her conduct had the potential to
damage the retailer's reputation "in the market place
and the community". Coles was -
under an obligation to act upon such misconduct and,
in my view, the actions it took were fair, reasonable
and warranted, not withstanding [her] long career.
next page
(elsewhere)
|
|
blaw