On Monday, the Federal Court of Australia handed Qantas a record fine of A$90 million for breaching the Fair Work Act by unlawfully terminating the employment of 1,820 ground workers during the pandemic.

The decision to impose this penalty – the largest ever issued under the Fair Work Act – marks the final instalment in a five-year litigation saga initiated by the Transport Workers’ Union (TWU).

Delivering the ruling, Federal Court Justice Michael Lee ordered $50 million of the fine be paid to the union, partly to act as a deterrent that “should encourage others to pursue compliance with industrial relations laws”.

The fate of the remaining $40 million will depend on a later hearing to determine if some or all of it should be paid to the sacked workers. That would be on top of $120 million in compensation already agreed.

A quick recap

This saga began in 2020, after the TWU launched an action alleging that Qantas had unlawfully terminated the employment of 1,820 ground handling workers when it made the decision to outsource the staff at the height of the pandemic.

The union argued Qantas made this decision because of the workers’ future right to engage in collective bargaining and take protected industrial action when their enterprise agreement expired.

At trial, Qantas failed to show that this reason had not been a substantial and operative factor in making the outsourcing decision.

This meant that in making the workers redundant, Qantas had breached the Fair Work Act...

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