Workplace privacy has come to focus recently, in light of the recent fifth annual “Privacy Awareness Week” in Australia, an event organised by the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner to raise awareness about the country’s regulation of how businesses and agencies deal with private personal information.
Whether a worker is a contractor or employee has long been contemplated by the Courts. Recently it was revisited in the recent proceedings of Pruessner v Caelli Constructions Pty Ltd [2022] FedCFam2G (“Pruessner v Caelli”).
What happens to an employer when they fail to adhere to adequate workplace health and safety standards? That employer might be on the receiving end of an order to empty their pockets, according to the NSW Court of Appeal.
Following the pandemic, many people are looking at how to change the way they work. There has been recent discussion about whether a 4 day work week is the solution.
Menulog’s application for a new modern award for its drivers, signals a shift by some in the gig economy to recognising that these workers are in fact employees. This may have significant ramifications for the industry at large.
The thorny issue of whether an individual is an employee or contractor is of great significance and getting the classification wrong can mean the imposition of significant monetary penalties and liability for outstanding wages, taxes and other benefits. However, knowing with some certainty whether a person is an independent contractor or not is not clear-cut. In fact, this issue has occupied much of the Court’s time over the years and been the subject of considerable judicial consideration.
The High Court of Australia appears to have jettisoned previous views, and have recently handed down two significant decisions that revise the approach to be taken by courts when determining whether a person is an employee or independent contractor.
As we look over the year that was, and forward to 2022, now is the perfect time to reflect on the goals that your business would like to achieve in the coming year and how to best align your staffing needs, employment practices, and HR functions with those goals.
Despite considerable uncertainty over job security over the last 18 months, ironically, the last several months has seen a global trend of mass resignations.
We examine what has been termed in the United States, “the Great Resignation”, and whether those voluntary resignation trends can be expected to manifest in Australia.
We further examine what strategies Australian employers can develop and utilise to prevent mass resignations in their organisations so that Australian employers can retain their skilled workforce and can ‘get back to business’ as a matter of priority.
It is a question that comes up more frequently than one might think. That is, if an employee works for the same or a related entity over a number of years in different states and even countries, does all their service count for the purposes of long service leave?
Most people believe restraints are not enforceable. However, this is far from the truth.
In this client alert, we examine the mechanics of restraints and their enforceability.
The beginning of the financial year marks a number of important changes to the employment law area. These changes, relate to minimum wages, the unfair dismissal threshold, the Fair Work Information Statement and changes to the Superannuation Guarantee rate. A summary of the changes to come and what this means for your business is covered in this alert.
This time of year is typically when both employers and employees buckle down for mid-year performance appraisals. It can be a stressful time for some for many reasons. From an employer perspective, performance management and annual or bi-annual reviews instill dread as managers are tasked with conducting individual performance reviews. However, despite the angst and stress that accompanies performance reviews, not much else is achieved as a result of the review, other than to tick the relevant box stating they have been done. This surely cannot be the purpose of performance reviews. It certainly does not constitute appropriate performance management and the consequence of failing to have hard conversations can be costly.