Federal Circuit ruling maps how general protections claims can be pleaded after internal complaints
A West Australian yacht club has lost its push to force a former general manager to nail down the legal basis of his workplace rights claim, in a May 19, 2026 ruling that offers a useful map for HR teams handling general protections cases.
Michael Sassella ran South of Perth Yacht Club as General Manager from January 2023. The club terminated him on January 24, 2025. In March 2025, he filed in the Federal Circuit and Family Court alleging the club fired him because he had exercised workplace rights, breaching s 340 of the Fair Work Act.
According to the judgment, Sassella relies on three acts as the exercise of those rights. In May 2024, he raised what he calls a "Bullying Complaint" with the club, citing alleged defamatory comments published about his conduct as General Manager. In October 2024, he lodged a "WorkSafe Report" with WorkSafe Western Australia. Later that month, his lawyers sent a "Letter of Complaint" to the club alleging bullying and breaches of work health and safety law, and flagging a potential stop-bullying application to the Fair Work Commission or a workers compensation claim.
The club went on the front foot. It asked the court to order Sassella to file particulars showing the contract, instrument or law that actually entitled him to make each complaint under s 341(1)(c) of the Fair Work Act. In plain terms: prove your right to complain before you ask us to defend a sacking based on it.
Judge Ladhams declined.
The judgment walks through the law on workplace rights. An employee bringing a general protections claim has to show they exercised a workplace right. On the authorities, the ability to make a complaint must be underpinned by an entitlement - it doesn't arise just because someone feels there's something to complain about. But the entitlement doesn't have to be a clause in a contract that expressly grants a right to complain. An underlying right, such as the right to a safe workplace or the right not to be bullied, can do the work.
Sassella's lawyers had already set this out in a May 26, 2025 letter. They pointed to his right to a safe workplace under ss 3 and 19 of the Work Health and Safety Act 2020 (WA), the employer's duty in tort and implied contractual duty to take reasonable care to avoid injury to employees, and his right not to be bullied under Part 6-4B of the Fair Work Act. The Letter of Complaint also pointed to the right to bring a workers compensation claim under the Workers Compensation and Injury Management Act 2023 (WA).
The club argued the letter described its own duties as employer, not Sassella's right to complain. The judge wasn't persuaded. The information was enough, he found, for the club to understand the basis on which Sassella says he was able to make each complaint.
Judge Ladhams accepted the club's broader point that civil penalty cases need to be clearly pleaded - a contravention finding under the Fair Work Act carries real stigma for an employer. But he found Sassella's Form 2, which sets out his claim, was significantly clearer than pleadings the court has seen in comparable cases. Sassella had defined each complaint, annexed copies of the two that were in writing, and clearly identified the making of them as the workplace rights he was relying on.
The application for further particulars was dismissed. The substantive claim - that the club terminated Sassella because he made those complaints - has not yet been heard.
For HR, the practical signal is straightforward. When an employee raises a bullying complaint, files a WorkSafe report, or sends a lawyer's letter alleging unsafe systems, those acts can be framed as the exercise of workplace rights without needing to find a clause in the contract that says "you may complain." A subsequent termination can then sit inside the general protections regime, with the reverse onus that goes with it. The case is a reminder to document the reasons for any termination that follows internal complaints, WorkSafe contact, or workers compensation activity.
