It found the people and culture manager gave honest, reliable evidence, supported by the text message trail. She had encouraged the workers’ compensation claim, maintained compassionate contact, and was unaware of the complaint the worker said he raised with his colleague. Of the prohibited reasons put forward, the only one she could have been aware of was the workers’ compensation claim. But awareness alone was not enough – she had to have been motivated by it.
The judge put it plainly: if the workers’ compensation claim had been a motivating factor, the manager could have dismissed the worker sooner. She did not.
During the hearing, the judge intervened to flag a gap in the worker’s case. No alternative basis for the dismissal had been put to the people and culture manager in cross-examination – a problem under the rule in Browne v Dunn, which generally requires a party to challenge an opposing witness’s account before asking the court to reject it. Counsel was given the chance to recall the witness but declined.
The discrimination claim fared no better. The court accepted the worker had a mental disability within the meaning of the Act. But drawing on the Full Federal Court’s reasoning in Western Union Business Solutions v Robinson, the judge drew a line between a disability itself and the incapacity it causes. The worker’s inability to attend work was a consequence of his condition, not a manifestation of it. It was the non-attendance – not the condition – that drove the decision.
The workers’ compensation claim was ultimately accepted in August 2025, several months after the dismissal. But at the time of the decision, the claim had been rejected, and the court found it played no part in the people and culture manager’s reasoning.
