FWC Annual Report 2014-15

The Fair Work Commission (FWC) published its 2014-15 Annual Report (the Report) on 28 October 2015. There are a number of noteworthy points from the Report:

• Since August 2015, s.365 general protections applications started being conducted by conciliators in a telephone conference, like unfair dismissal conciliations, instead of conferences conducted by members in person. This previously only applied to matters lodged in QLD, WA and ACT. 
• The Agreements Pilot will be expanded to more include agreements. This involves a triage process where an administrative team undertakes the preliminary analysis of enterprise agreement approval applications before sending the application with a report to a member for decision. This currently applies to all applications in WA, TAS and ACT and applications in the building and construction industry in VIC.
• There were 1,743,653 unique visits to the FWC website which is a 15.5% increase from the previous year. Visits from mobile phones and tablets have increased 65% and 18.9% respectively from the previous year.
• The FWC recorded 120,535 views on the unfair dismissal eligibility quiz; 48,242 views on the anti-bullying eligibility quiz and 26,158 views on the general protections eligibility quiz.
• The median time from application to conciliation in an unfair dismissal matter was 28 days. The median time for an industrial action matter to be listed for hearing was 3 days.
• 97.1% of applications for enterprise agreement approval were finalised within 12 weeks.
• 42.8% of all matters were unfair dismissal applications (14,624/34,152) and agreement related applications accounted for 17.3% of all applications (5,922/34,152). 
• The number of unfair dismissal applications was down 1.2%, dispute applications fell by 13.6% and industrial action related applications saw a decrease of 3.6% when compared with the previous year.
• There was a 17.5% increase in general protections applications and a 57% increase in the number of appeals in 2014-15.
• 11,125 unfair dismissal conciliations were held with the majority of unfair dismissal matters settled at conciliation at a 79% settlement rate. 58.6% of those were settled for both monetary and non-monetary benefits.
• Approximately 10% of unfair dismissal matters proceeded to a final hearing and decision by a member. 77% of jurisdictional objections raised at the hearing were successful. Of the matters that proceeded to arbitration, 46% were found to be fair. In the 141 cases where compensation was granted, most were award under $20,000 and only 2 were awarded between $40,000 and the maximum order of $68,350.
• The FWC received 676 anti-bullying applications of which 60 were finalised by a decision. Only one order was issued and the remaining 59 matters were dismissed.

The full Report can be viewed at https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/documents/annual_reports/fwc-ar-2015-web.pdf. 

If you would like to know more about conducting matters at the Fair Work Commission, please contact National Workplace Lawyers on +61 2 9233 3989.

National Workplace Lawyers

Note — this is for information purposes only and does not purport to be comprehensive or to render legal advice.