The Industrial Relations Act 1979 has been amended to provide the Western Australian Industrial Relations Commission (Commission) jurisdiction to deal with claims alleging a breach of a specified public sector standard from 1 July 2025.

A referral of a public sector standards claim to the Commission may be made by a person when:

• A breach of public sector standards claim has been made to a public sector body
  • in writing; and
  • in accordance with the public sector body’s procedures for breach of public sector standards claims and the Public Sector Management (Breaches of Public Sector Standards) Regulations 2005
• in relation to one of the following specified public sector standards:
  • the Employment Standard regarding a transfer decision only
  • the Grievance Resolution Standard
  • the Performance Management Standard
  • the Redeployment Standard
  • the Termination Standard
  • any other specified public sector standard that has been prescribed by regulations
• The claim has not been resolved by agreement or withdrawn
• The 21-day agency resolution period has passed

There is a 28-day time limit to make a referral to the Commission.

The Commission may deal with the referral by conciliation and/or arbitration, and may: order that the decision/action of the public sector body be quashed; order that the process for taking the action be recommenced from the beginning or from a specific stage; direct the public sector body to take specific steps in the recommenced process; or order the public sector body to take specific action. Orders for compensation are not available.

Parties can be legally represented, and decisions are appealable.

Breach of public sector standards claims regarding recruitment, selection, appointment, secondment and temporary deployment (acting) decisions will remain referrable only to the Public Sector Commissioner.

For more information, please see here.