No small business exemption to work-from-home laws
Small businesses have been locked in Australia’s first legal right for staff to work from home, as industry figures warn it will send trade interstate and overseas.
All businesses will be subject to the Victorian government’s policy of legislating employees to reasonably work from home two days a week, Premier Jacinta Allan said on Tuesday.
The Prime Minister said an exemption for small businesses would be considered when a consultation period was launched in August.
But while the legislation is still being drafted, “important detail” was flagged off at a cabinet meeting on Monday.
Ms Allan said the policy would enable more women to return to the workforce, boosting participation rates and economic productivity.
“People want to see their right to work from home protected because it’s at risk,” he told reporters on Tuesday.
“They are at risk from employers refusing requests to work from home.”
Australian Council of Small Business Organizations chief executive Matthew Addison said the decision would create a cost and compliance burden for “mum and pop” operators and sole traders with as few as one employee.
“Small businesses don’t have a team of lawyers to interpret this,” he told AAP.
“They say they already lose one day a week to bureaucracy; here’s some more bureaucracy for them.”
Mr. Addison said the election-year legislation “appeals to a segment of the population” and that he does not believe there is a desire for it to expand across the country.
Victoria’s business and investment community has expressed concerns that the state is not business-friendly enough, giving rise to the slogans “Anywhere But Melbourne” and “Anywhere But Victoria”.
“We have borders but businesses and capital don’t,” Victoria Chamber of Commerce acting chief executive Scott Veenker said.
“The economy is in such a fragile state… that’s another reason why people are choosing other states or other countries to do business in.”
The policy, described by the Labor government, only applies to workers who can “reasonably” carry out their work from home.
“We haven’t tested it and it’s inherently uncertain,” said Swinburne human resources management expert Peter Holland.
“You can’t be a cashier at a small store and expect to work from home, but if you’re a back office worker, do you need to be at work every day?
“The mandate will be for companies that are a little bit stubborn – my way or the highway.”
Professor Holland said small businesses could benefit from providing flexibility to workers in a tight labor market and compared the reforms to Australia’s introduction of paid maternity leave in 1973 and superannuation in 1992.
“The world was going to fall, but it didn’t,” he said.
“This is a positive for everyone. We’re in a different world now, post-COVID.”
Victorian opposition attempts to avoid becoming politically trapped in the law; Liberal leader Jess Wilson says she supports working from home while demanding more details from the government.
Ms Allan has repeatedly pushed back against claims the move might not be legal, pointing to advice about “express provision” in the Fair Work Act for state-based anti-discrimination laws.
Article 109 of the Australian Constitution provides that if a state law conflicts with a Commonwealth law, the latter shall prevail.
“We have advice that this is constitutionally valid,” Ms Allan said.
“But let’s be clear, what do you say about someone who wants to go to the Supreme Court to strip a worker of their right to work from home?”
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