Recently, the Federal Government announced that it would become mandatory for employees in residential aged care to be vaccinated for Covid 19 to be able to continue to work in those settings.  All workers in these settings must have had, at least their first dose of a vaccine by a date to be set in September 2021. This recent announcement has led to speculation that there may be a softening of the position on mandatory

On 16 June 2021 the Fair Work Commission (FWC) released its 2021 wage decision.  A 2.5% increase will be applied to all Award rates and to the national minimum rate. The minimum weekly wage will increase from 1 July 2021 and will move to $772.60 per week or $20.33 per hour which is a weekly increase of $18.80. Although the increase will be applied to all Awards, the FWC has again staggered the dates from

Recently, the issue of employer mandated vaccines was considered by the Fair Work Commission (FWC) in the context of an unfair dismissal application. In this case, an employee was dismissed for failing to follow a direction from their employer to have the flu vaccination.  The employer is a childcare provider and issued a direction to all staff, other than those who, for medical reasons, are unable , to get the flu vaccination. While the FWC

The superannuation guarantee is an amount that an employer must pay into a superannuation account on behalf of each of their employees.  There is a minimum and a maximum salary which applies to the payment of the superannuation guarantee however, the vast majority of employees are entitled to the payment on their gross earnings. Where an employer fails to make the payments or makes them for an amount less than is required, the penalty to

What do employees need to do? Business owners, Directors and Senior Executives, have a legal obligation to ensure a safe workplace, as mentioned in our previous article. This includes a psychologically safe workplace, which by definition, would be a workplace without harassment. Recent announcements from the Federal Government mean that workplace obligations, which are already substantial, are set to increase. Although sexual harassment is only one form workplace harassment can take, it is however often