| Summary |
UNJUSTIFIED DISMISSAL - Serious misconduct - Summary dismissal - Applicant dismissed for causing collision with co-worker (X") on same bus route - Personal conflict between applicant and X - On balance of probabilities, applicant and X told to wait at designated point prior to avoid collisions, prior to accident - Disciplinary policy objective in Driver's Manual to "hopefully avoid" dismissal outcome - No opportunity to make submissions understanding dismissal possible outcome of disciplinary interview - No separation between interview and delivery of dismissal decision - No separate submission received about penalty - No opportunity to persuade respondent could be trusted in future - Fair and reasonable employer would have advised dismissal possible - Procedural unfairness - Fair and reasonable employer would not have concluded from evidence collision deliberate or intentional - Open to respondent to conclude accident avoidable if applicant had followed instruction to stop, and applicant at fault - Failure to stop about avoidability and carelessness rather than deliberate failure to followed instruction - Applicant's conduct less serious misconduct in manual, for which in most cases warning appropriate - Conduct did not justify serious misconduct requiring summary dismissal - Dismissal unjustified - Remedies - Contributory conduct 30 percent - COUNTERCLAIM - BREACH OF CONTRACT - Damages - Respondent claimed applicant breached implied term of employment agreement when disobeyed instruction - Sought damages for costs of repairing buses - Not within contemplation, when collective employment agreement negotiated, employees personally liable for damage - Counterclaim dismissed - Loss of revenue claim abandoned - Bus driver" |