Fonterra milk tanker driver sacked over drug find

A Whangarei milk tanker driver who had cannabis-smoking equipment in the Fonterra truck he was driving has lost his claim for unjustified dismissal.
Richard Arthur Moana Watts was sacked from Fonterra's Northland operations in December 2009 after a modified bottle top, used for smoking cannabis, was found in his truck by another driver.
Mr Watts took his case to the Employment Relations Authority (ERA), claiming he had been unjustifiably dismissed by Fonterra and that the company breached provisions of his employment agreement. However, the authority found the dismissal of Mr Watts was justified and was a fair and reasonable action by Fonterra in the circumstances.
The authority heard the bottle top found in his tanker had a hole drilled through it and a 3mm-4mm socket through the hole could be attached to a plastic bottle for smoking marijuana.
The driver who found the bottle top had previously been through police college. He said the inside of the socket was burnt and it had "definitely" been used to smoke marijuana and was "reasonably fresh".
The company investigated and found that Mr Watts had been driving the tanker immediately beforehand. Mr Watts had acknowledged the apparatus was his.
Fonterra acting team leader Paul Somers said in evidence that Mr Watts had told him the item was for home use and that what he did at home "doesn't concern" Fonterra. Mr Somers said his response was that while it may not be the employer's business what Mr Watts did at home, it did concern Fonterra "once it is in a company tanker".
He said after the discussion he told Mr Watts he should go home. Mr Somers said Mr Watts then took the object off the table and left the office. In evidence Mr Watts said he had admitted to Mr Somers he had smoked marijuana while "going through a rough patch a couple of months ago" but "never" during working hours.
Mr Watts said Mr Somers handed the apparatus back to him and said "nothing further will become of it."
But authority member Ken Anderson found the evidence of Mr Somers to be more probable.
"It is most unlikely that he would have told Mr Watts that nothing further would come of the discovery of a drug-related item in a company vehicle," Mr Anderson found.
At a later meeting Mr Watts told the company the item must have accidently fallen out of his bag and he had not used cannabis for about two months beforehand. He then said that the item had not been used for smoking cannabis and was in "new condition" and could be used as a fishing float.
He was sacked on December 18, 2009 and in his claim to the ERA said that at the beginning of its investigation Fonterra did not adequately express the seriousness of its concerns. Mr Watts said that because he denied the apparatus had been used for drug-taking, it was incumbent upon Fonterra to make further enquiries.