Sacked IRT In-Home Care worker Eddie Lee is taking advice on his next options and “probably will” lodge a claim with the Fair Work Commission (FWC) for wrongful dismissal within the 21 day limit.
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Sacked colleague and Milton resident, Shane Lyttle has revealed to Fairfax Media that IRT offered him a settlement after FWC proceedings which he knocked back through his lawyer.
“They offered a settlement, however the terms were unreasonable and I would have been gagged,” he said.
“I couldn’t live with my conscience if I accepted that and their breach of trust.”
“I love this community and want to be able to feel free in this community and continue to have free speech.”
Lee and Lyttle will join Federal Member for Gilmore Ann Sudmalis, to meet Aged Care Minister Ken Wyatt at Parliament House in Canberra tomorrow (March 3).
A third former IRT Group employee, who resigned in frustration from Sarah Claydon nursing home at Milton in 2015, will also attend.
IRT’s In-Home Care is co-located at Milton with Sarah Claydon nursing home, where the third ex-employee lodged two complaints about work practices she observed.
“They offered a settlement, however the terms were unreasonable and I would have been gagged."
- Shane Lyttle
Mr Lee was sacked last week for misconduct while on stress leave because he spoke to the Times.
IRT chief operating officer Craig Hamer emailed him a letter last week, terminating his employment for misconduct.
Mr Lee aired his grievances to the Times over IRT’s negative and punitive reaction against him and Mr Lyttle after they highlighted a number of IHC work practices that alarmed them in 2014.
A company spokesman added later “his employment was terminated with notice following a series of performance and behaviour related matters over a number of months, most recently a serious breach of IRT's code of conduct”.
Lee and Lyttle both scoff, furious over what they allege are multiple cover-ups.
“I just did my job,” Mr Lee said.
Mr Lyttle said a team leader’s threat via SMS to 19 staff in November 2013 not to process payslips unless they provided their annual update of driver’s licence and rego details was typical bullying (see SMS screenshot).
“After I complained to management the same request in 2014 was without threat - a nicer message on all our phones,” he said.
He lost his job last November.
IRT declined the Times offer to comment further on several aspects of today’s story.
Mr Wyatt asked his department for more information on the case, first raised at a Federal level before he became Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care, then pencilled in tomorrow’s meeting.
Mrs Sudmalis has backgrounded him over the Lee-Lyttle conflict.
Both men have been to the FWC over the past 18 months and Lee also went to the Aged Care Commission.
Not directly related, Attorney General George Brandis has launched a new inquiry by the Australian Law Reform Commission aimed at guarding against elder abuse.
To make a submission to the Law Reform Commission inquiry, contact ann.sudmalis.mp@aph.gov.au or mail PO Box 1009 Nowra 2541.
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