KEY POINTS:
A former Northland mill worker says he has got his mana back to go with the $40,000 he has been handed after being sacked for defending himself in a fight he did not start.
Anthony "Podge" Housham was fired by Juken New Zealand last April after an incident
at the Kaitaia plant where he made pallets.
But the Employment Court has now ruled the company should not have fired the 55-year-old for the fight with fellow worker Anaru Nathan and ordered it to pay Mr Housham lost wages and $20,000 for hurt and humiliation.
Although Mr Housham was bleeding and injured, Juken NZ made him fill out a statement before receiving medical treatment, a situation criticised by the court.
The court ruled Nathan had climbed up on the forklift Mr Housham was driving and attacked him.
Despite evidence Mr Housham was defending himself, Juken applied its "zero tolerance to violence policy" and sacked him. But the court said Mr Housham was entitled to reasonably defend himself from the attack and Juken had not made a fair and reasonable assessment of the incident.
The court also remarked Mr Housham was not a violent person and was well respected in the community as a Kaikarakia - a lay preacher in the Maori Anglican church.
Many of his family had initially believed the company's version of events and his "personal life fell apart".
The court also said Mr Housham had previously been unfairly demoted for taking industrial action. It ruled his lost income from the firing should be measured as at the higher rate of the job he was unfairly demoted from. Mr Housham said: "I've been given my mana back." He had found it difficult to find a new job and his reputation in the community had been damaged.
"If I hadn't been in the union, I would never have got this result," the National Distribution Union member said. "If I was just an ordinary bloke at Juken and not in the union, there is no way I could have gone to court and won this sort of thing.
"If you don't join the union and stand up with your fellow worker, you can't fight injustice."
- NZPA