This passage from an unfair dismissal case decision determined in the Fair Work Commission highlights one of the essential the legal test for a genuine redundancy namely whether “the employer no longer required the relevant job to be performed by anyone because of changes in the operational requirements of its enterprise”.
“[65] Factors leading to operational requirements can be both external and internal factors as described in Shachar v Electrical Home Aids:65
“In order for a dismissal to be a case of genuine redundancy, it must be established on the evidence that the employer no longer required the relevant job to be performed by anyone because of changes in the operational requirements of its enterprise. I quite agree that a mere ‘desire to do things differently’ would not be enough, because evidence of a mere desire does not say anything about ‘operational requirements’. But if the employer decides that its operational requirements have changed, and as a result, it no longer wants a particular role performed by anyone, this is plainly enough. The change to the operational requirements of the enterprise can arise from external events, but so too can it come about from internal matters, such as decisions that result from a reassessment or reappraisal conducted by the business of its own needs. It is the enterprise that determines what its operational requirements are. If an employer decides that a role is now surplus to operational requirements, there is a change in the operational requirements. This construction is in keeping with the plain meaning of the expression ‘change in operational requirements’; a reading down of the expression to require the intercession of an external force that brings about the change in operational requirements is neither textually supportable nor commercially sensible.””
Pinto v Further Ed Pty Ltd t/a Victorian Institute of Technology Pty Ltd- [2025] FWC 1393 delivered 20 May 2025 per Yilmaz C