Workplace Relations

Lawyers in our Workplace Relations team understand the delicate nature of employment issues and that a fundamental part of a business is its people.

Our clients rely on us to help them negotiate difficult and complex employment issues in a strategic, cost effective and timely manner.

The services we provide in the Workplace Relations area include:

• Preparation and negotiation of executive contracts and employment agreements;
• Representation of employers in unfair dismissal claims, logs of claims and breach of award proceedings and common law wrongful termination claims;
• Advice on equal opportunity and discrimination law and representation of employers and employees in discrimination and harassment claims;
• Development of HR policies including anti-discrimination and sexual harassment codes;
• Drafting statutory workplace agreements and independent contractor/consultancy arrangements;
• Disciplinary and redundancy procedures; and
• Defending workplace prosecutions and O H & S risk management.

Our experience in the Workplace Relations area includes:

• Advising a large energy generation company on the closure of its regional Victoria facility, the decommissioning of the plant and the redundancy of the workforce;
• Instigating Supreme Court proceedings to restrain a CEO from joining a competitor in the retail industry;
• Resisting a log of claim and limiting the operation of a new award in the adult entertainment industry;
• Defending a major WorkSafe prosecution involving a fatality in the construction industry;
• Assisting an international firm in its negotiations with Unions regarding an Enterprise Bargaining Agreement; and
• Advising an employer in relation to the termination of employees who had made improper use of the Company's email facility.