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Two employees have failed to win an injunction blocking their employer from dismissing them for misconduct, arguing they were targeted after campaigning for a new enterprise agreement.

Federal Court Justice John Snaden found that based on a preliminary assessment of the evidence, the two United Workers Union organisers had failed to establish a prima facie case that showed that the employer took adverse action for a proscribed reason.

In an interlocutory hearing, the employees claimed that after they signed and encouraged other workers to sign a petition seeking majority worker support to bargain for an enterprise agreement, the employer began investigating them for misconduct, alleging among other things that they bullied colleagues into signing the petition...