The recent Federal Court of Australia decision of
Broadlex Services Pty Ltd v United Workers' Union [2020] FCA
867 has confirmed that a unilateral change to contract terms
and conditions, namely a reduction of hours and a change from
full-time to part-time, can give rise to an obligation to make a
redundancy payment under section 119 of the Fair Work Act 2009
(Cth) (the "FW Act").
Background
Ms Vrtkovski was employed as a full-time cleaner for Broadlex
Services Pty Ltd ("Broadlex"), a
supplier of cleaning services to the electricity distributor
Ausgrid. In July 2017, Broadlex entered into a new contract with
Ausgrid that involved a reduction in the provision of cleaning
services. As a consequence of that reduction, Broadlex informed Ms
Vrtkovski that her status would be changed from full-time to
part-time and that her hours would be reduced from 38 hours to 20
hours.
