Healey v Health New Zealand

This Employment Court decision was about notice and timing, not the final merits of the employment dispute. The Court had to decide whether Ms Healey's communications in early November 2021 were enough to raise a personal grievance with her employer.

The Court said they were. Looking at the totality of her letters, emails, incident report and meeting comments, it found she had raised an unjustifiable disadvantage grievance about the vaccination requirement and the employer's process for applying it to her role.

That meant the earlier Authority ruling was overturned. The case could continue, but only on that procedural footing. The Court did not decide in this judgment whether the stand-down, termination, or vaccination-related decisions were justified overall.

Ms Healey worked as an administration support worker in the radiology department of Whanganui Hospital. In October 2021, the Government announced vaccination requirements for certain health and disability workers under the COVID-19 Public Health Response (Vaccinations) Order 2021.

The Order became effective on 25 October 2021. From 15 November 2021, certain work had to be carried out by affected workers who were vaccinated. On 28 October 2021, Health New Zealand wrote to Ms Healey setting out its intended approach and effectively telling her she needed to be vaccinated or risk losing her job.

Ms Healey disagreed with both the requirement and the way it was being applied to her employment. Between 4 and 12 November 2021, she sent a series of communications and attended a meeting with a support person. Across those exchanges, she raised concerns about vaccine safety, whether the Order covered her role, whether an individual health and safety risk assessment should be done, and whether alternatives such as regular testing and other controls could be used.

She also described the impact the situation was having on her health. On 8 November 2021 she filed a health and safety incident report recording situational trauma, stress, anxiety, insomnia, nausea and severe headaches.

Health New Zealand stood her down on 15 November 2021, effective from 16 November, and terminated her employment on 17 November 2021. It then heard nothing further until 4 November 2024, when Ms Healey lodged proceedings in the Employment Relations Authority.

The Authority decided that her earlier communications had not actually raised a personal grievance. It treated them as part of an ongoing consultation process and found they did not make it clear that she was raising a grievance. Ms Healey challenged that preliminary determination in the Employment Court.

The legal issue was narrow but important. The Court had to decide whether Ms Healey's communications were sufficient to raise a personal grievance within the time required by the Employment Relations Act 2000.

Under the Act, a grievance is raised when the employee has made, or taken reasonable steps to make, the employer aware that the employee alleges a personal grievance that the employee wants the employer to address. The Court also noted that the grievance process is intended to be informal and accessible. A grievance can be raised orally or in writing, and there is no mandatory formula of words.

At the same time, not every criticism of an employer is a personal grievance. The employer must be given enough information to understand what it is being asked to respond to on the merits.

The Court also noted the three-year long-stop in the Act. Because Ms Healey lodged proceedings on 4 November 2024, any grievance allegedly raised before 3 November 2021 could not be pursued. That made the communications from 4 to 12 November 2021 especially important.

The Court rejected Health New Zealand's narrow approach to the communications. The employer had argued that none of the individual items was enough. It said the 4 November letter only referred to a possible future grievance, the medical certificate did not raise concerns to address, the incident report was too disconnected, the 9 November email did not ask for action, the 10 November meeting was only consultation, and the 12 November letter still did not amount to a grievance.

The Court disagreed. It found that the communications from 4 to 12 November 2021 did more than simply express disagreement. Together, they identified Ms Healey's concerns about the Order and its application to her role, criticised the employer's process, described the impact on her, and set out what she wanted Health New Zealand to do.

The Court highlighted several points. In the 4 November letter, Ms Healey said Health New Zealand had failed to undertake an objective analysis or proper process before directing her to be vaccinated. In the 9 November email, she said she believed amendments to the Order meant her role was not covered. At the 10 November meeting, she raised the need for a workplace risk assessment and other control measures.

In the 12 November letter, she said she was willing to take regular COVID tests and wanted other options investigated.

The Court also treated the 8 November health and safety incident report as relevant because it recorded the alleged impact the employer's conduct was having on her in the workplace. The judgment noted that Health New Zealand closed that report without engaging on whether the injury was continuing or what had caused it.

On balance, the Court found that the totality of the communications raised concerns with the Order and Health New Zealand's application of it to Ms Healey's employment. They were sufficient to raise an unjustifiable disadvantage personal grievance.

The Court also made an important limit clear. The communications before the stand-down and termination did not purport to raise separate grievances about those later steps themselves. So the judgment did not hold that Ms Healey had raised an unjustifiable dismissal grievance or a separate grievance about the stand-down within 90 days.

Although this dispute arose in the COVID-19 health sector context, the durable lesson is broader. Employment complaints often arrive in fragments. An employee may send one email objecting to a requirement, then a follow-up letter, then raise concerns in a meeting, then report stress or health effects. If you read each item in isolation, you may miss that the employee is actually alleging unfair disadvantage and wants you to address it.

This matters because grievance timing rules can decide whether a claim survives. If an employer wrongly assumes no grievance was raised, it may lose the chance to respond early, clarify the issues, or resolve the matter before it escalates into litigation.

The case also shows that consultation and grievance issues can overlap. An employee can still be participating in a process while also communicating a complaint serious enough to count as a grievance. Do not assume that because a discussion is framed as consultation, it cannot also carry grievance content.

Just as importantly, do not overread the judgment. The Court did not decide that Health New Zealand's vaccination-related decisions were unlawful. It decided only that Ms Healey had done enough to raise an unjustifiable disadvantage grievance about the requirement and the employer's process in applying it to her role.

This case is a reminder that grievance content can appear in ordinary workplace documents. It is not limited to a formal lawyer's letter or a document headed personal grievance.

Here, the Court looked across letters, emails, a health and safety incident report, and comments made in a meeting. What mattered was the combined substance of those communications.

For a business owner or manager, the warning signs are practical. If an employee says your process is flawed, disputes the basis for a workplace requirement, explains how the issue is affecting them, and asks you to revisit the decision or consider alternatives, you should pause and assess whether you are already dealing with a grievance.

If an employee is objecting to a workplace requirement, the safest response is organised and documented. You do not need to concede that a grievance exists, but you should act as though the communications may later be examined together by a court or the Authority.

A good process will not guarantee the underlying decision is upheld. But it can reduce the risk of a separate dispute about whether you ignored a complaint, misunderstood it, or failed to engage with it properly.

The challenge succeeded. The Court held that Ms Healey had raised an unjustifiable disadvantage personal grievance in her communications between 4 and 12 November 2021, and that it was raised within the required 90-day period.

The Court also noted that the Authority no longer had the matter before it and there was no power to remit it back. As a result, the problem remained before the Employment Court for resolution.

Ms Healey was directed to file and serve a statement of claim within 14 days of the judgment. Costs were reserved, with directions given in case the parties could not agree on costs.