Employers brace for wave of copycat sex claims

This article was published in The Sydney Morning Herald 19 October 2010

A source of inspiration for victims of sexual harassment that forces bosses to lift their game, or a pyrrhic victory that encourages a string of spurious claims?

Kristy Fraser-Kirk's decision to accept an $850,000 settlement of her sexual harassment suit against David Jones and its former chief executive, Mark McInnes, has sent public debate about the case into overdrive.

The implications are already being felt in the legal and corporate worlds, and in workplaces across the country.

Some industrial lawyers are beginning to talk about ''the Fraser-Kirk effect'': the lodging of claims which have certain striking similarities to that of the much scrutinised 27-year-old.

''In a couple of cases it's like they're taking almost verbatim from her statement of claim and drafting it into their letters of demand,'' the managing partner of Australian Business Lawyers, Tim Capelin, said.