Royal Embassy [etc] v Saleh [2025] FCAFC 184
Foreign states now enjoy only limited immunity from domestic jurisdiction10. In an unfair dismissal action by mission staff, the embassy argued that the Fair Work Commission was not a ‘court’. Therefore, the employment exception to immunity did not apply11, & the embassy had absolute immunity at common law.
This was rejected. The definition of ‘court’ includes a ‘tribunal or other body’ that has judicial functions or powers or are ‘of a kind similar to judicial functions or powers’. An ALRC report explained the broad scope of this definition. Given Commission proceedings are adversarial and involve application of legal principle they are ‘of a kind like judicial functions or powers’12.
This principle is from Episode 130 of interpretation NOW!
Footnotes:
10 Foreign States Immunities Act 1985 (Cth), Firebird [2015] HCA 43 [5-7].
11 ss 9 & 12 Foreign States Immunities Act 1985 (Cth).
12 [5, 48, 56], cf Kirby (1956) 94 CLR 254 (281), TCL [2013] HCA 5 [29].