# Response

**(a)**
Classification: employee

**(b)**
The High Court adopted the **contractual construction approach**: where the parties have reduced their relationship to a comprehensive written contract that is neither a sham nor varied by subsequent conduct, the characterisation of that relationship as employment or independent contracting must be determined solely by reference to the legal rights and obligations created by that contract. Courts are not to overlay the contract with a separate "totality of the relationship" or "practical reality" inquiry. Applying the orthodox multi-factor indicia (control, integration, results-based payment, provision of equipment, ability to delegate, etc.) the exercise is conducted on the face of the contract, not on how the parties actually behaved post-contractually.

The leading case is **Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union v Personnel Contracting Pty Ltd** [2022] HCA 1 (decided 9 February 2022, together with **ZG Operations Australia Pty Ltd v Jamsek** [2022] HCA 2). In *Personnel Contracting*, a young itinerant worker (McCourt) signed an "Administrative Services Agreement" labelling him a self-employed contractor, but the contract reserved to the labour-hire company the right to direct his work, place him on client sites and control the manner of performance. The High Court (Kiefel CJ, Keane and Edelman JJ, with Gordon and Steward JJ concurring in the result) held he was an employee, because on a proper construction of the contractual terms the company retained the hallmark right to control how he worked and he conducted no independent business of his own.

**(c)**
The labour-hire company must make **Superannuation Guarantee (SG) contributions** for the worker. In FY 2025-26 the SG rate is 11.5 % of ordinary time earnings. Having treated him as a contractor, the company will have made no SG payments; reclassification exposes it to the SG charge (unpaid contributions plus interest and an administration charge) payable to the ATO, together with potential penalties for failure to meet quarterly payment deadlines — a direct and immediate financial liability that cannot be passed back to the worker.