The court flagged shifting disability descriptions as a fatal flaw in the officer's claim
A former WA Police officer's disability discrimination claim, spanning sick leave, a vaccine direction, eviction from her home, and dismissal, has been struck out.
On 8 May 2026, the Federal Court of Australia struck out the statement of claim filed by former Western Australia Police officer Victoria Louise Williams against the State of Western Australia (WA Police Force). The decision in Williams v State of Western Australia (WA Police Force) [2026] FCA 569 has caught the attention of employment lawyers and HR professionals watching how post-pandemic vaccine mandate cases play out.
Williams had been with WA Police from January 2007 until she was dismissed on 17 June 2024. In November 2021, the Commissioner of Police issued an employer direction on 24 November 2021 (which was effective from 1 December 2021) that required all WAPOL employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19 and to provide evidence of having been vaccinated or evidence that they were entitled to rely on an exemption from being vaccinated. Supplementary directions and guidance were issued by WAPOL on 30 November 2021 and 30 December 2021, which provided that the original direction did not apply to employees who were on an approved form of leave and that it would only apply upon their return to work. Williams had been on approved sick leave since 1 November 2021.
In June 2022, she lodged a disability discrimination complaint with the Australian Human Rights Commission. She argued that her medical condition meant she could not, and did not need to, comply with the vaccine direction. The Commission terminated her complaint on 24 April 2024 because there was no reasonable prospect of it being settled by conciliation.
What followed reads like a stress test of HR processes. Formal disciplinary hearings conducted under section 23 of the Police Act 1892 (WA) ran for what the court described as an unusually prolonged period of approximately 21 months and 16 days, and involved two separate hearings. Williams was stood down despite providing what she said were valid medical certificates. Her family was evicted from Government Regional Officer Housing in Augusta, with the employer pointing to her "prolonged absence" as the reason, while she pleaded that other officers on approved leave for other reasons were not required to vacate GROH housing. She was dismissed on 17 June 2024.
Williams then took her case to the Federal Court, alleging direct and indirect disability discrimination in employment under sections 5, 6 and 15 of the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth), discrimination in the provision of accommodation under section 25, and victimisation under section 42 for the continuation of the disciplinary process after her Commission complaint.
Justice Vandongen struck out the entire statement of claim. The court found Williams had described her alleged disability in shifting ways across her Commission complaint, her court application, and her statement of claim, leaving the employer guessing about the case it had to answer. The pleadings, the court said, did not properly spell out the material facts behind the discrimination allegations, and improperly mixed direct and indirect discrimination claims based on the same facts.
The court also held that her dismissal-based discrimination claim fell outside its jurisdiction, because the dismissal happened almost two months after her Commission complaint had been terminated, and so could not satisfy the requirements of section 46PO(3) of the Australian Human Rights Commission Act 1986 (Cth). The victimisation claim under section 42 of the Disability Discrimination Act was struck out for separate reasons: amendments made in December 2022 by the Anti-Discrimination and Human Rights Legislation Amendment (Respect at Work) Act 2022 expressly exclude section 42 conduct from the definition of "unlawful discrimination" that the court can determine, and in any event the alleged victimising act post-dated, and did not arise out of the same acts as, the terminated complaint. The judge indicated he would refuse to allow Williams to re-file the victimisation claim and the dismissal-based discrimination claim, and will hear the parties further on whether the remaining claims can be re-pleaded, and on costs.
The substantive question of whether dismissing an unvaccinated employee on long-term sick leave amounts to disability discrimination was not decided.
There are a few threads in this case that are worth pulling on. Vaccine-era dismissals are still working their way through the courts more than four years on. Supplementary directions and exemptions matter, and inconsistent treatment of employees on different forms of approved leave, particularly when employer-provided housing is involved, can surface as a discrimination flashpoint. Long-running disciplinary processes, especially ones that stretch past 21 months and overlap with active human rights complaints, invite scrutiny. And the timing between a complaint, a disciplinary outcome, and a dismissal can shape what an employee can later argue, and where.
