Government must legislate on work Web use - Clayton Utz

By Mark Chillingworth

Clayton Utz is calling on State and Federal government to create legislation setting out acceptable Internet and email usage by employees at work. The law firm said today that it will begin pressing governments to act before it is too late.

Joe Catanzariti is a senior workplace relations partner for the Clayton Utz law firm. Because there is no Federal or State legislation, Mr Catanzariti believes that Australian employers are at risk of losing dismissal tribunals. The law firm has seen inconsistent rulings over staff dismissals because there is a lack of education and policy on Internet and email usage in the workplace.

"What seems to be emerging is a lack of clarity in the tribunals. It would be nice to have something that is black and white," Mr Catanzariti said. Adding, "The confidence of companies seeking to do the right thing by their staff by cracking down on employee email and Internet misconduct is being undermined." He said it is not employee bashing.

Clayton Utz said legislation and business policy needs to tackle the downloading of pornography, using email for illegal purposes, discussions over email that would be illegal out in the open in the workplace, and using the email and Internet for personal purposes. Mr Catanzariti said there have been examples of email being used for sexually harassing conversations. "It is not saying that you cannot use the Internet for personal use, providing it is not excessive. I see excessive use as separate to offensive use," he said.

Mr Catanzariti said the time has come for legislation; "Everytime we don't self-regulate legislation has to rescue us." Adding that the 1970s saw the introduction of anti-discrimination laws to try and prevent white Australians discriminating against blacks, and the 1980s saw the health and safety laws brought into the workplace. He believes that today's technology age needs legislation to protect workers in the same way as blacks did in the 70s.

"Both Federal and State must co-operate to develop and implement a legislative framework that provides certainty to those companies prepared to adopt a hard line against employees caught improperly using email or Internet systems," he said, adding "We are trying to encourage the government to accept this as a big issue."

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