KEY POINTS:
Two Waipa Youth and Whanau Trust workers were unfairly suspended and dismissed from their jobs, the Employment Relations Authority has ruled.
But it did not find the aggrieved pair blameless, docking a large part of their compensation because they spent many hours of work time on their personal sporting activities.
Michelle Ryan and Tracey Paekau claimed they were unjustifiably suspended and dismissed from the Te Awamutu-based trust and sought lost remuneration, compensation of $20,000 each and costs of $8344.50 each.
The employees were suspended for alleged serious misconduct and were then dismissed following an investigation by the trust.
Ms Ryan was employed as manager/counsellor with a salary of $32,000 and Ms Paekau was employed as an administrator and worked 20 hours a week at $14 an hour.
The trust said that from mid-2005, it became concerned about Ms Ryan's management of the counselling unit.
The authority said that among other things, the trust in its investigations found Ms Ryan and Ms Paekau had been insubordinate and dishonest.
They had followed personal sporting activities rather than work, even though that had been expressly forbidden.
The trust found that they had used work time to apply for funding for their personal interests and that phone cards, postage, and petrol purchases had been excessive and misappropriated.
The trust also found documents had been falsified and contracts suspiciously altered; and a general refusal to co-operate. Virtually no trust work was carried out on some days or weeks.
But the authority said the process the trust followed in coming to those conclusions was deficient as the trust had not established that the immediate suspension of the pair was justified and it ought to have consulted the employees before making the decision.
As for dismissals, the entire process was dogged by bias and predetermination.
In particular, the trust did not tell Ms Ryan and Ms Paekau about the specific concerns it had about their conduct and did not allow them the opportunity to explain or deny the allegations.
The authority directed the trust to pay Ms Ryan $2500 for her suspension.
It made no award for lost remuneration however, because "had the board carried out a fair investigation it would have reached the finding that there was serious misconduct on Ms Ryan's part justifying her dismissal".
But to remedy a "significant" negative effect on Ms Ryan to have had her conduct unjustifiably labelled as "fraudulent" it awarded her $10,000.
Ms Paekau was awarded $3500 for the suspension of her employment and the authority said her dismissal was "completely unfounded".
The trust was directed to pay Ms Paekau three months' lost pay less 25 per cent to reflect the excessive work time she spent on personal sporting activities.
Ms Ryan and Ms Paekau were awarded costs of $10,000 in total.
- NZPA
