Don't fall foul of General Dismissal Protections

While you may be confident that your workplace has good processes in place to mitigate the chances of an unfair dismissal claim, it is important that you understand the general worker protections contained in the Fair Work Act 2009.

Terminating a staff member’s employment on one of these grounds will allow the staff member to apply to the Fair Work Commission, seeking to invalidate the termination. These grounds include:

• Temporary absence from work because of illness or injury,
• Trade union membership
• Filing of a complaint against the employer,
• Race, colour, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion, political opinion,
• Absence from work due to maternity or parental leave.

If the employer has evidence and believes that you have terminated them on these grounds, they can apply to the Fair Work Commission (‘FWC’). A conference is held to deal with the dispute and, if your employee is successful, the FWC can issue a certificate to this effect. Ultimately, the employee can end up seeking a particular Court order preventing you from terminating them. 

If you have further questions, please contact us at frank@franklaw.com.au

This is not legal advice. 

Written by Tim Cargill & Zdenka Marinov and edited by Andrew Graham.