Wyndham council has been ordered to reinstate a worker who was sacked on the word of an undercover private eye.
The private investigator was hired by the council in December last year to pose as a casual labourer and spy on parks and gardens workers after management received allegations of staff using and selling drugs during work time.
Supervisor Phillip Leyshan and four other workers were sacked in February after an investigator secretly photographed and recorded alleged misconduct, handing evidence to council managers.
The council sacked Mr Leyshan for failing to properly supervise his staff and ignoring his responsibilities. He was not accused of handling drugs.
The workers appealed their sackings to the national industrial umpire, the Fair Work Commission.
Last Monday, the commission ordered the council to reverse its sacking of Mr Leyshan.
The four other sacked workers reached settlements with the council and dropped their cases in June.
The spy and the legal battles that followed the sackings set ratepayers back $354,892, the council has revealed.
Fair Work commissioner Anna Cribb criticised ‘‘significant defects’’ in the council’s behaviour.
“The evidence before me is that the council took the report on face value and accepted it as if it was gospel,’’ she said.
‘‘The council, therefore, did not attempt to ‘colour in’ the details regarding [Mr Leyshan’s] supervisory approach and practice which is, naturally, not captured by a set of observations made over a six-week period.”
Ms Cribb also found that Mr Leyshan, who had worked for the council for 25 years, had never received a written warning.
Mr Leyshan’s lawyer, Harriet Shing, said councils had to give serious consideration to how they approached such situations.
‘‘Simply because an outsider planted in their workforce says something happened doesn’t exonerate them from what’s required under law,’’ she said.
Wyndham council chief executive Kerry Thompson defended the decision to fight the workers’ unfair dismissal claims, despite the cost.
‘‘We considered we could not allow wastage of ratepayer funds when staff are not doing the right thing at work,’’ she said. ‘‘We had to draw a line in the sand.’’
Ms Thompson said the commissioner had found that Mr Leyshan had not adequately performed his duties as supervisor; he would return to work with council in a non-supervisory role.
She would not say if the council would continue to hire private investigators to spy on staff.
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