The ice cream melted on a trip from Melbourne to Wagga. Photo: ERH Refrigerated Transport/Facebook.
A truck driver who was sacked after transporting ice cream that accidentally melted on a trip from Melbourne to Wagga Wagga has lost his unfair dismissal claim.
According to a published judgement, the Fair Work Commission ruled that Jeremiah Manly was validly dismissed by Victoria-based ERH Refrigerated Transport after his refrigerated trailer was not set at the correct temperature, causing almost $74,000 worth of ice cream to defrost on a delivery made in December 2025.
Mr Manly’s job was to drive refrigerated freight between Wagga Wagga and Melbourne. On 3 December, he collected a load of ice cream from a cold storage facility in Truganina before returning to Wagga where another driver was due to take the truck to Sydney.
However, instead of being set to the required minus 22 degrees Celsius, the trailer was left at minus 1 degree throughout the trip.
By the time the mistake was discovered and the temperature was remotely corrected, the entire load had defrosted. The ice cream, valued at almost $74,000, had to be thrown out, with disposal costs pushing the company’s total loss above $100,000.
ERH dismissed Mr Manly five days later.
Mr Manly stated to the Fair Work Commission that he could recall setting the temperature at the correct level but could not explain why it “didn’t take”.
He submitted that ERH had not established that he was solely responsible for the loss of the load, saying he could not understand why his truck had been loaded if the temperature was too high. He also noted another driver was involved in the journey.
But Commissioner Damian Sloan found Mr Manly had multiple opportunities to check the trailer temperature during the trip and failed to do so.
Mr Sloan said it was not necessary for Mr Manly to have been solely responsible for the situation in order for ERH to have had a valid reason to dismiss him.
“He can still be held to account for what he did or did not do,” Mr Sloan stated in his published decision.
The commission found the company had made a procedural error by deciding to sack Mr Manly before giving him a chance to respond to the allegations.
“Procedural fairness requires that an employee be notified of the reason for which their employer is considering dismissing them and be given an opportunity to respond before the decision to dismiss is taken,” Mr Sloane wrote.
“To give an employee an opportunity to respond after a decision had been taken to dismiss them would be ‘like shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted’.”
However, he ruled that this alone did not justify a case for unfair dismissal.
“Had Mr Manly been given an opportunity to respond to the reason for his dismissal prior to the decision having been taken, it is unlikely that it would have had a material bearing on the outcome,” he ruled.
“ERH had a valid reason to terminate Mr Manly’s employment. There was a procedural irregularity in the process that ERH took to effect that dismissal.
“However, when weighed in the balance in the circumstances of this case and according the parties a ‘fair go all round’, it was not so significant as to render the dismissal unfair.”
The unfair dismissal application was dismissed.
