Lawlor v Dartbridge Welding Pty Ltd

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES COURT OF AUSTRALIA

LAWLOR v DARTBRIDGE WELDING PTY LTD & ANOR [2007] FMCA 2119

INDUSTRIAL LAW – Imposition of civil penalty – breach of Workplace Relations Act – failure to lodge AWA’s within time prescribed.

Workplace Relations Act 1996 ss.407(1)(b), 407(1)(a)

CPSU v Telstra (2001) 108 IR 288

Applicant: LISA FRANCES LAWLOR

First Respondent: DARTBRIDGE WELDING PTY LTD
ACN 010 301 292

Second Respondent WAYNE ROBERT HARRISON

File number: BRG 606 of 2007

Judgment of: Jarrett FM

Hearing date: 25 October 2007

Date of last submission: 25 October 2007

Delivered at: Brisbane

Delivered on: 25 October 2007

REPRESENTATION

Counsel for the Applicant: Mr Herbert

Solicitors for the Applicant: Fisher Cartwright Berriman

Solicitors for the First Respondent: N/A

Counsel for the Second Respondent: Mr Miller

Solicitors for the Second Respondent: AI Group Legal

ORDERS

1. That pursuant to subsection 407(1)(a) of the Workplace Relations Act 1996 (Cth), the Second Respondent pay to the Commonwealth a pecuniary penalty in the sum of EIGHT THOUSAND FOUR HUNDRED DOLLARS ($8,400.00).

2. That the Second Respondent pay the said penalty within twelve (12) months of the date of this order.

3. That the Application against the First Respondent be dismissed.

FEDERAL MAGISTRATES
COURT OF AUSTRALIA AT
BRISBANE

BRG 606 of 2007

LISA FRANCES LAWLOR

Applicant

and

DARTBRIDGE WELDING PTY LTD
ACN 010 301 292

First Respondent

and

WAYNE ROBERT HARRISON

Second Respondent

REASONS FOR JUDGMENT

Ex tempore

1. This is an application by Lisa Frances Lawlor, who holds a statutory position, for the imposition of a pecuniary penalty on the first and second respondents pursuant to ss.407(1)(b) and 407(1)(a) respectively of the Workplace Relations Act 1996. 

2. The application against the first respondent is no longer pressed; that company is in liquidation and the prospect of recovering any pecuniary penalty against that company is apparently zero.

3. The application is, however, pressed against the second respondent who at all material times to this application was the managing director and perhaps the only shareholder of the relevant company.

4. It is probably as well to say a few words about what this case is not about.  It is not about the political correctness or the rights and wrongs of AWA’s.  It is not about the political correctness, or the rights and wrongs of using foreign workers in Australia.  It is not about the use of 457A long-stay visas for the importation into Australia of foreign labour.  It is not about using foreign labour that might or might not bring economic advantages to the particular employer concerned. 

5. This case is not about any of those things, but rather about a relatively simple matter - the failure by the first respondent and the second respondent to lodge Australian Workplace Agreements in accordance with the provisions of the Workplace Relations Act 1996 in respect of a number of worker’s recruited from the Philippines and Malaysia to work in the first respondent’s business in Brisbane.

6. The second respondent accepts that he is a person involved in the relevant contraventions for the purposes of…