Leo, the only one I have heard of occured against Woolworths in the Latrobe Valley around a week ago. A quick internet search should pull up a media report. I know the prosecution was discussed on LinkedIn very recently.

regards
Leo Ruschena
4/4/16

Training for managers and staff to deal with confilct or bullying behaviour may make some difference. The training could include relationship training too. Often bullying when investigated really sees that relationships are at the bottom of it!

Managers would do well to look at Restorative Justice Practices training too.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/video/vic/-/watch/29359410/bullying-allegations-against-vic-police/

Of all the people involved in the goings-on at Cafe Vamp that led to Brodie Panlock’s suicide, I have the hardest time understanding how the owner of the cafe failed to take sufficient action over a worker’s welfare when they were aware of what was occurring in their workforce.

Sometimes young people do silly things because they are young but an older person, running their own business, knowing that assistance and guidance is available if they are unclear of their legislative and moral duties. I struggle with that.

There are good employers, bad employers, lazy employers and negligent employers but OHS law does not consider these personalities. There is a blanket law that applies to all employers to provide a safe and healthy work environment, there is also a “reasonable person” test. We can criticise OHS regulators for not taking action but we should not overlook the pivotal role of business managers in looking after their people.

It could be easyier for those concerned and their families, if we had a government prepared to make South Australian work places safe. All it would take is giving Safe Work SA or SAPOL the power to prosecute.

I have had discussions with various people within the safety industry about the challenges facing bullied workers.
Their concern was not what would be found, but the cost involved in holding small meetings or one on one meetings.
I will refrain from writing what my response to the dollar v people answer was.

Rosemary, I think consultation will be a major part of the Federal Government’s inquiry. Public hearings have already been scheduled. I note that they are in the capital cities but the need for rural consultation is not unheard-of in these inquiries, if a case can be made. I would have thought the recent report by the NSW Mining sector into mental health would have justified a rural consultation.

I think we have to wait to see how the committee wants to consult, what rules they apply at the hearings and how much time they can allow to people who may provide distressing information. I have described elsewhere that the Federal Workplace Relations Minisnter, Bill Shorten, has committed to listening to the people. I think we have to wait and see but I expect that the inquiry is going to want evidence and not anecdotes. This will be a challenge in an area of industrial relations, safety and human resources, where (mis?)interpretation of social interaction is behind all workplace bullying issues.

My work puts me in touch with bullied workers and bullied -by the workers compensation system- injured workers.
The level of pain that shows in every part of the persons life is incredible, but even so they are more fearful of having a workers compensation claim for workplace or workers compensation bullying because they know it will add another layer of stress that they may not survive.

All too often they have seen other bullied workers forced out of their job whilst the bully is promoted or shifted to another work site to continue the bullying behaviour.

What is needed is in my opinion is the safety industry to hold meetings in various CBD-Regional-Rural-Remote areas and hear what the people have to say, then act on the information given.

It is far too easy to enact a law such as Brodies Law, it is a lot harder to actually do the work needed to hear the people.
But in my opinion until the people are heard little to nothing will alter.