On 12 December 2025, Murphy was charged with one offence of obtaining financial advantage\u00a0pursuant to\u00a0s.135.2(1) of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth), described in the decision as the Criminal Proceedings. Earlier that day, at 12:46am and 2:05am, his then representative had already filed his submissions and evidence in the unfair dismissal matter. Murphy was served with notice of the Criminal Proceedings\u00a0later on\u00a012 December.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The unfair dismissal arbitration was listed for 4 and 5 February 2026. After the charge was laid, Murphy, through his new representative, applied to have the Commission stay his unfair dismissal case until the Criminal Proceedings were finalised. He\u00a0submitted\u00a0that continuing with the unfair dismissal arbitration at this time would give rise to a real risk of prejudice in the Criminal Proceedings, including by requiring him to give evidence, make admissions or\u00a0disclose\u00a0aspects of his defence while the criminal charge remained unresolved.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Services Australia opposed the stay. It argued that a stay of proceedings is an extraordinary remedy and that Murphy had already had significant opportunities to put his case, including during the disciplinary process and in the material filed with the Commission. It pointed out that his statements and submissions were already admissible in the Criminal Proceedings and\u00a0submitted\u00a0that, viewed as a whole, he had effectively failed to exercise his right to silence. The employer also raised concerns about delay: that\u00a0witness\u00a0evidence might become less reliable over time, that it could incur further expense, and that a longer delay could increase potential exposure to remedies such as reinstatement and lost wages.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Commissioner Spencer accepted that there is no automatic entitlement to a stay simply because criminal proceedings are on foot. The task was to balance the interests of both parties and decide\u00a0what justice\u00a0required\u00a0in light of\u00a0the Fair Work Act\u2019s requirement that the Commission act in a manner that is fair and just and provides a \u201cfair go all round.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
A key factor was the substantial and direct overlap between the unfair dismissal case and the Criminal Proceedings. Both turned on the same AGDRP claim, and the alleged facts in the Criminal Proceedings formed a significant basis for the reasons for dismissal. The Commission found that, to properly present his unfair dismissal case, Murphy would\u00a0likely have\u00a0to give evidence and be cross\u2011examined on those same matters, creating a real risk of prejudice to him in the Criminal Proceedings.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On 12 December 2025, Murphy was charged with one offence of obtaining financial advantage\u00a0pursuant to\u00a0s.135.2(1) of the Criminal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":462906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,237450,44,48161,51844],"class_list":{"0":"post-462905","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-criminal-proceedings","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-services-australia","13":"tag-unfair-dismissal"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=462905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/462905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/462906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=462905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=462905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=462905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}