Uni of Melbourne fined $75,000 over unpaid work hours for casuals

The University of Melbourne has been fined $75,000 for threatening to black ban casual academics after they complained about unpaid work hours.

The University of Melbourne has been fined $75,000 for threatening to black ban casual academics after they complained about unpaid work hours.

The University of Melbourne has been fined nearly $75,000 after it threatened to blackban two casual academics after they complained about being required to work unpaid hours.

The university was taken to court by the Fair Work Commission, which alleged the university took “adverse action” against the two academics because they exercised a workplace right.

The two casual academics in the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, who had taught for several years at the university, were warned by a supervisor in August 2020 that they should not claim beyond their contracted hours if they wanted to work in the following year.

In February 2021 one of them did not have her contract renewed after she claimed an extra five hours for work performed.

The university paid a penalty of $37,295 for each case.

Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said the university’s actions affected fundamental employee rights and inhibited people from speaking up about their rights in the workplace.

“If employers become aware of concerns their employees may be being underpaid, including directly from the employees, the only appropriate response is to check that they are paying their employees correctly and promptly rectify any compliance issues discovered,” Ms Booth said.

Justice Craig Dowling of the Fair Work Commission said there was a need for deterrence in the penalty because the university had a “a significant percentage of casual employees “.

The University of Melbourne said it had taken responsibility for its actions and co-operated with the Fair Work Ombudsman, “including by accepting liability early and agreeing on the amount of the penalty to put before the court for this matter”.

The university also said it had paid separate compensation to the two academics. One of them received $10,000, the other $4000.

“The university has also taken significant steps over the last few years to improve its systems, processes and training for managing employees, including implementing new training and guidance on casual employment and improved oversight of casual employee management more broadly,” the university said.

National Tertiary Education Union national president Alison Barnes said the case was “another damning example of what the explosion in insecure work means for staff on the ground”.

“A $75,000 fine is welcome, but shocking incidents like this will keep happening unless there are major changes to universities’ ­broken governance model,” Dr ­Barnes said.

“Rampant casualisation has fuelled an insidious culture of exploitation, which leads to workers’ livelihoods being threatened for simply asking to be paid properly.”

The University of Melbourne is facing a separate court action from the Fair Work Commission alleging it underpaid 14 casual staff in the Faculty of Arts by a total of $154,424.

Instead of paying the staff (for marking assignments) by hours worked they were paid according to benchmarks. Staff were allegedly required to claim for benchmark, instead of actual, hours.