Uneven access to working from home is creating a "two-tiered system", with low-waged workers less likely to work remotely, the ASU told the Senate inquiry into the Greens WFH bill, while the Productivity Commissioner says the cost of remote work for employers can be "difficult to quantify".
Uneven access to high-quality flexible work is contributing to a widening wealth gap, with workers who have access to "good flex" better able to balance work and caring responsibilities, "while those in bad flex are pushed into more precarious work", new academic research has found.
The FWC has ordered a university to allow an advisor to work from home one day a week, despite finding it had reasonable business grounds to reject the two-days-a-week WFH flexibility request she made on the basis of her age.
A bargaining dispute between the FSU and the Reserve Bank heads to the FWC today, as the union seeks to head off a second-round offer it believes will be unchanged from an original proposal voted down in July.
The FWC has thrown out a worker's flexible work bid after she attempted to "call in" older medical documents and conceded she had not been diagnosed with the disability identified in her request.
Victorian Premier Ben Carroll has today revealed details of the amendments to the work from home Bill that he negotiated with business groups, as debate on the legislation resumes.
The FWC has upheld a council's decision to refuse a worker's flexible work request, finding it had reasonable business grounds to align rosters with its revised operating hours and increase employee presence for safety reasons.
The FWC has taken on board a FIFO Shell worker's failure to attend physiotherapy appointments after breaking his back, in dismissing a dispute over the flexible work job-share bids he and a colleague lodged to ease their way into retirement.
Employers are hoping high-level meetings with Victoria's new-look State Government will this week confirm that it will significantly amend a work-from-home bill to assuage concerns over OHS liabilities, "stacking" and an unrealistic timeframe.
A federal authority's concerns that a dispute resolution specialist will miss out on face-to-face connections by working from home 100% of the time while looking after his child are among reasonable business grounds for refusing his request, the FWC has held.
