The applicant applied for stop bullying orders against the respondent, his employer, which asserted that its conduct constituted reasonable management action. After initially filing his application, the applicant subsequently made amendments to it several months later, and then applied to make further amendments to his application.

The applicant contended that he should be permitted to further amend his application because he had recently secured legal representation and had subsequently received advice that an amendment ought to be made. He submitted that this second amendment had not caused undue delay in proceedings.

The respondent argued that the proposed amendments amount to initiating new proceedings against additional individual respondents, which exceeds the Commission’s power to amend applications under the Industrial Relations Act 1979 (WA) and the Industrial Relations Commission Regulations 2005 (WA).

Commissioner Walkington determined in favour of the respondent’s claim that granting the second amendment would add several individual respondents and amount to initiating new proceedings against them. The Commissioner, in refusing the application, acknowledged that the proceedings had been pending for some time already, and that it would not be equitable to grant leave to amend the application a second time.

The decision can be read here.