r/AusLegal

My son (15 yo) recently started his first job working part time casual at a small takeaway place.

It's a small business that serves pre-cooked food, the ones where you select a few stew/casserole dishes from heated trays. As the food is pre-prepared the owner usually comes in in the mornings, cooks the food and then disappears until its time to close up in the evening.

This leaves my son by himself for about 80% of the day. The shop is never super busy so my son has no issues handling serving and receiving money himself.

My question is pertaining to breaks. As there is no lunchtime cover, my son generally eats or goes on bathroom breaks when there are no customers around. He can't go far and generally goes to the back for a few mouthfuls until the next customer comes in.

Surprisingly, the boss still deducts 60 mins from his timesheet per shift as a 'lunch break'.

I questioned the owner on this and his response was that my son is actually lucky because he is 'on break' whenever there are no customers around and the total of his 'breaks' ads up to way more than an hour.

That doesn't sound right, I always figured a break has to be continuous and my son technically is still working because he is required to come back anytime a customer walks in.

It's my son's first job so he is inclined to leave it but I just wanted to check if anyone else has any experience and or suggestions?

I am an ex gambling addict and have struggled with being shown gambling adverts constantly. I report them each time but it doesn't reduce the amount of advertising. I have spoken to customer support 3 times and they've told me each time to keep reporting them.

I then spoke on the phone to customer support and they admitted the adverts are random and reporting them does nothing. I feel uncomfortable paying more money just to not be shown them and from what I understand the ACMA legally requires companies to allow customers to opt-out of gambling advertising.

Does anyone know if they are actually legally obligated to protect their customers in this way or if they're so big they get away with it?

I'm so fed up and frustrated

When I was pregnant with my first child, my partner was offered an amazing career opportunity interstate.

It wasn’t just the job itself. It meant no more FIFO, being home every night and living closer to family. My nephews were there. It felt like the blessing we needed before our son arrived.

The plan was simple. He would move first, find us a rental and our baby and I would join him before the birth.

He moved in October.

By January there was still no house.
I was due to give birth in just three months, so the clock was ticking. We still had nowhere to live, no plan in place, and I was running out of time before our son arrived.

So I flew over with a pram, bassinet and car seat in tow, hoping we could finally find somewhere to live and start preparing for our son’s arrival.

Instead of finding us a house, I found out he had been drinking, taking drugs and lying to me the entire time he had been there.
And how did I find this out?
Another girl’s Spotify account was logged into the TV.
To this day he denies cheating… lol 🙄

A few days afterwards I flew back home with the pram, bassinet and car seat and got ready for the arrival of our son here.

He eventually came back before our son was born, but the drinking, lying and drug use continued until about a week before I gave birth.

When my son was born, my mum was in the delivery room with me. Not his dad. I couldn’t even look at him.

A few months later I decided to try again.
He was maintaining staying sober and my heart carried a lot of guilt for our son. I had brought this beautiful little baby into the world and I wanted to be able to say I had tried my best to be a family. I wanted him to have the opportunity to grow up with both of his parents together.

Although still to this day, I can’t say I’ve forgiven what his dad did during my pregnancy.

At first everything seemed okay.
I was really trying to make it work and I genuinely wanted us to be a family.
As time passed though, it became clear that we had completely different mentalities.

He was working away for four days at a time and then home for three.
On those three days, his priorities seemed to be the gym, the sauna and getting a haircut.
I remember asking one day if I could please have a shower before he left and somehow that turned into an argument.
At the time I put up with a lot because, at the end of the day, he was away working and he was the provider.

When our son turned six months old, both he and I had severe gastro. His dad left to go to the shops to get some Hydrolyte. I ended up falling asleep with our son for a few hours. When I woke up, I had messages from his dad saying he had bumped into some friends and stopped to get something to eat. Hours passed and he still hadn’t come home. I messaged him multiple times begging him to come back and make sure he brought the Hydrolyte because both his son and I were so unwell.

He didn’t come home that night.
In fact, he didn’t come home for three days.
At that point I packed up his stuff and he moved out.
That was the end of our relationship.

It’s been roughly eight months since we separated and I can honestly say it has been the worst eight months of my life. Not only was I learning how to do motherhood on my own, I was grieving the journey I thought I was going to have. Trying to process the fact that I was never going to get that experience of pregnancy and motherhood where you feel loved, safe and supported. No memories together to cherish, Trying to accept that the future I dreamed was gone.

Because I took on the role of SAHM and haven’t been able to return to work full-time, he was contributing financially towards and our expenses and I used my savings to contribute to extra things.

Every single week the fact he has been providing has been used against me in one way or another.
I’ve been told I should be grateful for everything he’s given us. I’ve been threatened over and over again, if I don’t do things his way the money will stop.

Because of his history of drug and alcohol abuse, I made it a boundary that if he was taking our son out of my care and I had concerns he may have been under the influence, he would complete a drug test first.

In the last eight months he has missed more scheduled time with his son than he has attended. He has in fact missed 87% of scheduled days.
He has refused countless drug tests.
Sometimes he simply doesn’t show up at all.
Other times he confirms nd then cancels the next morning.

This man earns over $200,000 a year. He has stopped helping me financially and he picks and chooses when he will pay child support
I am really running low on my savings. I used to earn good money too when I was working away, and I saved every cent I could because I knew having a baby would change things.
The difference is that I will never have those same opportunities again while I’m the primary carer of our son.
I’m now on a single parent pension and my rent alone is $650 a week. I makes me so mad I am having to use the money I worked so hard for that was a deposit for our future home.

Honestly, I’m exhausted.
Not because I’m raising my son on my own.
I’m exhausted because for the last eight months it feels like I’ve spent just as much time managing his bullshit as i have trying to give our son a happy peaceful little life.

I haven’t got it in me to keep having the same arguments over and over again.
Every week feels like limbo.
Will he pay child support?
Will he show up?
Will he cancel?
Will there be another argument?
Another email full of abuse?
Another issue?
At this point I don’t even know what the right answer is anymore.

Do I see a lawyer and put formal parenting orders in place?
Do I even want that for our son?
Do I ask for additional financial support?
Do I pursue a superannuation split so I don’t have to keep burning through savings just to get by?

I honestly don’t know.

What I do know is that I never imagined this would be my life when I found out I was pregnant and most of all my heart breaks for our son.
What a mess I’ve made of things.