The Fair Work Ombudsman lost its argument for $4.1 million in penalties against the CFMEU for industrial action at shipping terminals in Sydney and Brisbane, with a judge instead fining the union just $38,000.
Federal Court Justice Jayne Jagot ruled Thursday that the week-long coordinated strikes by the then Maritime Union of Australia in August 2015 at Hutchison Ports was a single contravention of the Fair Work Act and that no further compensation was appropriate.
The Ombudsman had sought $3.5 million in penalties and another $620,000 in compensation to Hutchison. It argued that the maximum penalty in the case was $30 million because the strikes amounted to 278 lost working shifts, each shift was a separate contravention of the Fair Work Act that attracted a maximum fine of $54,000 and the MUA both organised and was involved in the strikes, so breached the law twice for each contravention.
In siding with the union, Judge Jagot ruled the Ombudsman’s argument for 278 contraventions was an “artificial construct of the FWO’s making”.
“The MUA was engaged in one overall concerted action to bring industrial pressure to bear on HPA not to implement the proposed redundancies at the Sydney and Brisbane terminals in a manner which the MUA considered would be in breach of the enterprise agreement, would result in the unlawful termination of around 100 employees, and destroy its own capacity to continue to function as an effective industrial organisation,” the judge said.
