Three cases involving police officers and health workers fighting their employers’ COVID-19 vaccine mandates are set to take centre stage in the Queensland Supreme Court during a five-day trial this week.
This week, one group of objecting Queensland Health employees and Queensland Ambulance Service staff will be involved in the Supreme Court trial. This group is led by Bernard Witthahn.The other two cases involved were put forward by Queensland Police Service employees – they are led by Shaun Sutton, and the other by Dylan Johnston.
Jonathan Mamaril, who specialises in employment law at Brisbane firm NB Lawyers, said the likes of healthcare workers and emergency services personnel were still subject to vaccine mandates.“From the government perspective and from general discussion points, it seems those mandates are still in place as a protection mechanism because of the belief that these frontline workers would have much more exposure to COVID-19 ...
“In the private sector, I’m not sure how many employees [who objected to the vaccine mandates] are still with those companies, but if some are still around, they may be able to get back onto site.