Editorial: Lessons for all parties in cake case

Karen Hammond

The Human Rights Tribunal case of a woman who baked a cake with an abusive message to her former employer on top in icing has certainly divided our readers.

We received many comments on our website and Facebook page after Napier woman, Karen Hammond, who baked the offensive cake about her former employers, was yesterday awarded more than $168,000 in damages following a Facebook breach of privacy and "loss of dignity".

Check out the story on the cake here.

Ms Hammond left NZ Credit Union Baywide (NZCU) in March 2012 and five days later baked the cake for her workmate, whom she believed had been constructively fired from the company. The fruit and chocolate chunk cake, with "Credit Union Baywide f*** you" and "c***^" in pink icing, was taken to a dinner party of 10 friends and an image uploaded to social media.

She said her former bosses had breached her privacy by taking a screenshot of the offending cake from her Facebook page and distributing it to recruitment agencies and her new employer. The tribunal agreed and awarded her $168,070.88 in damages.

Although Ms Hammond won the case and probably rightly so under the circumstances, she has not come out of this looking very good.

Most right-thinking people would view her actions as over the top and childish, but equally Baywide's reaction smacks of malice and vindictiveness.

Ms Hammond showed an astonishing lack of judgement, but Baywide should simply not have gone out to destroy her with what was private information, even though it was on Facebook.

It is probably a lesson to employees and employers alike about how to behave in an age where everything one does can come under the microscope of social media and potentially destroy reputations.

Hopefully all concerned have learnt from this.