718AFalse or misleading information or documents

718A False or misleading information or documents

(1) A person must not give information or produce a document to the Fair Work Ombudsman, an inspector, or a person referred to in subsection 712AA(2), (the official) exercising powers or performing functions under, or in connection with, a law of the Commonwealth if the person knows, or is reckless as to whether, the information or the document:

(a) is false or misleading; or

(b) for information—omits any matter or thing without which the information is misleading.

Note 1: This subsection is a civil remedy provision (see Part 4‑1).

Note 2: Sections 137.1 and 137.2 of the Criminal Code create offences for providing false or misleading information or documents.

(2) Subsection (1) does not apply as a result of paragraph (1)(a) if the information or the document is not false or misleading in a material particular.

(3) Subsection (1) does not apply as a result of paragraph (1)(b) if the information did not omit any matter or thing without which the information is misleading in a material particular.

(4) Subsection (1) does not apply to a person who produces a document if the document is accompanied by a written statement signed by the person or, in the case of a body corporate, by a competent officer of the body corporate:

(a) stating that the document is, to the knowledge of the person, false or misleading in a material particular; and

(b) setting out, or referring to, the material particular in which the document is, to the knowledge of the person, false or misleading.

(5) Subsection (1) does not apply if, before the information was given or the document was produced by a person to the official, the official did not take reasonable steps to inform the person that the person may be liable to a civil remedy for contravening subsection (1).

(6) For the purposes of subsection (5), it is sufficient if the following form of words is used:

“You may be liable to a civil remedy for giving false or misleading information or producing false or misleading documents”.