Woolies worker’s texts to young staffer after Christmas party revealed
A Woolies manager has been fired over a move he made on a colleague who was 34 years younger than him at a Christmas party.
A Woolworths worker has been fired following allegations he sexually harassed a much younger co-worker, sending her a string of messages expressing his love for her and asking her to go out together, in the months after their workplace Christmas party.
Alex Pushik, 63, a Russian national and former fruit and veg manager at Wentworthville Woolworths, in Sydney, was dismissed in May over his interaction with a 29-year-old employee identified only as Ms Ghimire, who worked a part-time staffer in the store’s Fresh Team and was on a student visa from Nepal.
Mr Pushik submitted an unfair dismissal claim, which was rejected last month, with documents released by the Fair Work Commission (FWC) revealing the emoji-laden messages and public Facebook comments he wrote to Ms Ghimire.
According to the FWC judgment, Ms Ghimire was at her workplace Christmas party in late November 2024 when she noticed Mr Pushik staring at her “from a distance at different times”.
Mr Pushik later rushed up to her and said “You look so beautiful today”, before grabbing her and kissing her on the cheek.
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Ms Ghimire said she awkwardly tried to push the manager off her, claiming that the pair had not spoken much to each other at work before the party and the pair had no interactions outside of work.
Shortly after, on December 1, Mr Pushik began messaging Ms Ghimire on Facebook, when he sent an emoji with heart eyes, the judgment states.
In the messages, the 63-year-old also wrote: “Beautiful girl”, “Can I take you out one day”, “Love you” and sent emojis of hearts, lips and two people kissing.
Ms Ghimire did not respond.
Mr Pushik also began replying to Ms Ghimire’s Facebook Stories, saying things like “Beautiful” and even commenting on older social media posts, including one where he wrote “be my Valentine” with images of hearts.
The messages continued in March this year with more declarations of love.
Between March 18 and 30, Mr Pushik sent Ms Ghimire messages reading “beautiful”, “beautiful girl”, an emoji of person with hearts in their eyes, and another reading “can take you out one day”, which was followed by an emoji of a person with hearts in their eyes.
He also sent another message with a red lipstick kiss emoji, a thumbs up emoji and an emoji of two people kissing
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He also commented on Ms Ghimire’s Facebook page on 18 March, writing: “Always love you”.
Between April 5 and 7, he sent her messages reading “love”, “I love you”, and “Do you love me”.
Ms Ghimire again did not respond to these messages.
Mr Pushik had also made comments to the 29-year-old in the store when no one was around, saying she was “beautiful” and was “always looking so pretty in photos”.
In one instance, Ms Ghimire asked Mr Pushik for assistance in performing her duties and responded with “I would do anything for you” - a comment heard by two colleagues.
The colleagues asked Ms Ghimire about his behaviour and why he appeared to be” obsessed” with her, including commenting on her Facebook photos.
Ms Ghimire felt “humiliated” during the exchange,” the judgment states.
Another time, Ms Ghimire was closing the deli during a shift and Mr Pushik asked whether she wanted to go out for a drink with him.
Ms Ghimire said, “No I’m not going with you”. But Mr Pushik showed her karaoke videos, seemingly trying to convince her to go with him, and told her about the private karaoke rooms in Russia.
When Ms Ghimire said she did not want to go, Mr Pushik said that he had seen videos of her going to karaoke from her Facebook page.
Feeling “uncomfortable”, Ms Ghimire again rejected the invitation.
The 29-year-old made a complaint about Mr Pushik’s behaviour to the Store Manager in April after he noticed she was upset at work.
Ms Ghimire was hesitant to make a complaint as she was worried about being involved in any legal processes as an international student while also balancing her studies and managing with the emotional stress of the situation, the judgment states.
She said she had become anxious and lost sleep over the situation, but was worried that her concerns might not be taken seriously.
“As a person of colour, I was also worried that I might not be believed,” she said.
Mr Pushik was fired in May after an internal investigation.
He appealed to the commission in August and argued that the messages he sent Ms Ghimire did not constitute sexual harassment as they were not sexually explicit.
In his application, he argued: “If all of my love messages and emojis were taken into account I could be accused of sexual harassment not only of my friends and family members, but of their dogs, cats, ferrets or other pets”.
He had earlier said in a meeting in April that “no harmful meaning” was intended by his emojis and spoke of “Ms Ghimire being like a granddaughter” to him.
Mr Pushik has also argued his comments regarding Ms Ghimire’s appearance such as “beautiful girl” did not have any sexual subtext and that his comments such as love heart emojis or “I love you” was part of the workplace banter and should be seen as an expression of thanks.
Mr Pushik said Ms Ghimire was not very responsive to his interactions with her, as she was likely “getting out with probably different sort of people” but said he “wouldn’t mind taking Ms Ghimire out, for example, to a show,” as he likes to go to them regularly.
He also agreed that he had received Code of Conduct training in February 2024 and that he did the training every two years.
Evan Issa, a Group Manager at Woolworths, ultimately made the decision to dismiss Mr Pushik.
“Woolworths takes sexual harassment very seriously because of the harm it causes our people, and I weighed this seriousness against Mr Pushik’s age (63) and the fact that he had not had any history of similar conduct,” he said.
“One of the most significant factors in his decision-making was Mr Pushik’s apparent lack of remorse about his conduct. He denied that his conduct was inappropriate and instead offered justifications, suggesting that his behaviour was typical and consistent with how he interacted with others.
“His insistence that this behaviour was typical concerned me because of the risk of him doing this again with another staff member.
“Despite Mr Pushik saying that he didn’t think he did anything wrong in sending the messages, I had regard to his response when he was asked why he kept the messages private which was that others might ‘misinterpret’ them. This demonstrated to me that he had some understanding that it was inappropriate.”
FWC Deputy President Alex Grayson found Mr Pushik’s “behaviour fell well below community standards and expectations”.
In his judgment, Mr Grayson said he considered the 34-year age gap between the co-workers and that while Mr Pushik was not Ms Ghimire’s line manager, he was the “third most senior person employed at the store and could direct Ms Ghimire’s work even though she did not work in his section”.
He also noted that Ms Ghimire was vulnerable as she was an international student.
“He was working with a young and vulnerable woman over whom he could exert authority. They were not friends. He admits that he wanted to take her on a date, he sent her numerous unreciprocated inappropriate messages, he repeatedly asked her on dates even though she had declined or was unresponsive. He caused Ms Ghimire considerable distress.”
Mr Pushik’s application was dismissed.
Originally published as Woolies worker’s texts to young staffer after Christmas party revealed
