Are third party emails admissible in an unfair dismissal?

[Anne Thompson]

Hi there,

I'm just wondering if third party emails are admissible in an unfair dismissal trial before the fair work commission?

An old colleague of mine was fired some time ago. He emailed me incessantly after he was fired trying to get me to speak about my own resignation. The truth is that my resignation in large part was down to his conduct but as I had informed the company of this confidentially I did not want to mention this.

I made some statements regarding the workload and some parts of the company that I indeed wasn't happy with. None of them untrue but also made under duress as he was harassing me and me not wanting to divulge the real reason as this was confidential between me and the company.

He is now taking the company to the fair work commission for a claimed unfair dismissal. I do not believe he was unfairly dismissed and have provided the company with a witness statement regarding his conduct that ultimately lead to my resignation.

Could my email to him be used as supporting evidence to his unfair dismissal case without my consent?

 

[Rod]

Yes. He doesn't need your consent.

What matters is whether the emails are relevant to his dismissal.

 

[Anne Thompson]

Yes. He doesn't need your consent.

What matters is whether the emails are relevant to his dismissal.

I'm not sure if they would be relevant. I talked about my own resignation but did mention the workload, which was in part down to his conduct which I took up with the company. I did not mention anything regarding his dismissal, I wouldn't know anything about that as I had already resigned at that point. I have no idea what his grounds for claiming unfair dismissal are but I'm assuming it is in part workload, which was indeed crazy but he thought it entitled him to taking days/hours off that were not approved which only resulted in more workload for those surrounding him.

Would my statement about my own workload be relevant to his case? I assume he would have to prove that his own workload was too much and not somebody else's?

 

[Rod]

Would my statement about my own workload be relevant to his case?

Can't comment without seeing all the material. If I was a lawyer for the employee I'd want to read the emails and decide whether it supported a case I was preparing at the FWC. If anything, even one sentence supported an argument I wanted to run, then the material goes to the FWC.