15 Oct 2014

Court rules against cannabis dismissal

1:55 pm on 15 October 2014

The Employment Relations Authority has ruled against a company that dismissed a staff member who tested positive for cannabis.

The Tauranga branch of fertiliser company Ballance Agri-Nutrients forced the man to undergo the drug test after someone phoned them, saying he had smoked marijuana in a Tauranga carpark.

But the Employment Relations Authority ruled the company was not entitled to make the employee take a drug test.

Ballance was ordered to pay $3000 compensation and almost $11000 in lost wages to the man.