Monique Ryan’s former chief of staff Sally Rugg has settled her workplace law case against the independent MP and the commonwealth for $100,000.
The settlement, first reported by the Age and independently confirmed by Guardian Australia, involves no admission of fault by the member for Kooyong or the federal government.
All sides have agreed to pay their own legal costs, sources with knowledge of the settlement negotiations confirmed, although parties have refused to comment because a final settlement deed has not been signed.
Rugg launched the federal court case in January, alleging that she was required to work “unreasonable” additional hours in breach of the Fair Work Act and that the commonwealth took “adverse action” when Ryan dismissed her.
Court documents detailed a breakdown in the relationship between Rugg and Ryan over work hours and Rugg’s decision to fly home to self-isolate after she contracted Covid-19 in late November.
After mediation in February Guardian Australia reported that Ryan was keen to settle the matter but the commonwealth’s offer fell short of securing a settlement with Rugg.
In March Rugg added a claim of “serious contravention” by the commonwealth for the “knowing and systematic” breach of labour standards.
The federal court rejected Rugg’s bid for an interim injunction to allow her to keep her job pending the full trial.
In April Rugg’s statement of claim blamed the decision by the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, to cut crossbench staff, arguing it amounted to a direction to staff to work longer hours.
The case was shaping up to be a major test case, both of Albanese’s decision to slash crossbench staff from eight to five and the definition of “reasonable” additional hours beyond a standard 38-hour week.
Rugg’s statement of claim said that from July to December she “regularly worked over 65 hours a week including weekends” and “worked an average of 58 hours a week”.
In March Rugg’s lawyer Josh Bornstein said the commonwealth had been “on notice of unlawful excessive hours being worked for parliamentary staffers for many years, including by reason of inquiries and reports to parliament”.
“Most recently, [sex discrimination commissioner] Kate Jenkins’ [2021] Set the Standard report documents that staffers working excessive hours was an important factor in an unsafe workplace.”
Rugg is a Melbourne-based LGBTQ+ activist and feminist who played a leading role in the yes campaign during the marriage equality vote in her former position at GetUp, before working as the executive director of Change.org.
Ryan was elected in 2022, ousting the then deputy Liberal leader and treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, from his blue-ribbon inner-Melbourne seat.
