In recent years, the Victorian Government has pushed a controversial labour policy, seeking to become the first jurisdiction in the world to enshrine the right to “work from home” (WFH) in law, allowing eligible employees to work from home for up to two days a week, in proportion to their working arrangements.
However, the bill took an unexpected turn before the vote. On September 10, the Victorian Coalition, together with several crossbench MPs, voted 18 to 17 in favour of referring the bill to a parliamentary committee for inquiry. As the committee is not due to report until October 20, while Parliament will rise after September 24 until the state election, the bill is essentially unable to pass during the current parliamentary term.
On the surface, this is a policy aimed at increasing workplace flexibility and improving work-life balance. But behind it lies a series of practical and management challenges. Should WFH become a legal right? What impact would WFH have on society? And the most fundamental question is: how far should the government intervene?
From “Company Benefit” to “Legal Right”
The most significant change introduced by the bill is to transform WFH from an arrangement determined by employers into a right that employees can legally request. Eligible employees whose jobs allow them to work remotely can apply to work from home for up to two days a week. Applications must be made in writing, while employers must respond within a specified period. If an application is refused, the employer must also provide an alternative arrangement and reasonable grounds for the refusal.
However, this right would not apply to all employees. Probationary employees, apprentices, interns, participants in graduate programs and some casual workers are excluded from the scheme. Even where an employee is eligible, an employer can refuse a request based on operational requirements, such as when work must be performed on site, involves on-site equipment, or when WFH would affect productivity, safety, training, customer service or data confidentiality.
If a dispute arises over a WFH arrangement, an employee can first seek conciliation through the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission. If the matter cannot be resolved, it can be taken to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT).
The Practical Challenges Facing Businesses
Once WFH changes from an arrangement determined by individual businesses into a legal right, businesses will need to deal with more than simply deciding whether employees can work from home. They will need to establish a long-term system for managing work arrangements. Businesses will need to determine which positions are suitable for remote work, how employees should submit applications, and what principles managers should use when making decisions. When different employees make similar requests, businesses will also need to ensure that applications are handled fairly and consistently to avoid disputes.
In practical management terms, businesses will also need to deal with who provides and maintains equipment, how company information can be securely accessed outside the office, and how office space should be reorganised. When employees can work from home on different days, managers will also need to reorganise staffing to ensure enough people are present when face-to-face collaboration is required, while maintaining work handovers, meetings and day-to-day communication. For teams that need to respond to customers immediately, they will also need to ensure that services continue to operate normally when employees are not in the office.
Training and employee performance management may also need to change. For new employees, some work skills and company culture that were previously learned gradually through everyday interaction with colleagues may require more formal training and communication as WFH increases. Managers also cannot rely simply on whether an employee is physically present in the office to assess how work is progressing. They will need to rely more heavily on work outcomes, progress and regular communication.
For large businesses, these issues may be handled by existing human resources, IT and management teams. But for small businesses with limited staff and resources, establishing a WFH system, processing applications, providing equipment, maintaining information security and reorganising office space could all create additional costs.
Does Higher Individual Productivity Mean Higher Overall Productivity?
For many jobs that rely primarily on computers, working from home can bring various benefits. Employees do not need to spend time commuting every day and may find it easier to concentrate in a quieter and familiar environment. For work involving long periods of document processing, writing or data analysis, completing the work at home may not be very different from doing it in the office, as long as suitable equipment and an internet connection are available.
However, higher individual productivity does not necessarily mean that the overall workflow of a business will become more efficient. For tasks with fixed processes that can be completed independently, remote work may be highly effective. But when work involves cross-departmental coordination, immediate decision-making or frequent collaboration, employees being spread across different locations may increase the time required for communication and coordination.
One employee may be more focused at home and complete their part of a task more quickly. But if the team then needs more time to wait for responses, reorganise tasks or communicate, the overall workflow may not become faster. From an employer’s perspective, what needs to be considered is the operation of the entire team and business, rather than simply whether an individual employee can complete their work at home.
This also shows that whether WFH can improve overall efficiency depends to a large extent on the nature of the work and how a business operates. Different positions have different requirements, and the effects of working from home may vary between employees. When governments establish statutory WFH arrangements, they therefore cannot simply apply the same standard to all businesses and jobs.
The Importance of Face-to-Face Interaction
The role of the office is not limited to getting work done. For many people, the workplace is also an important social environment in their daily lives. Seeing colleagues every day, chatting, having lunch together, or even having a few casual conversations during work are all part of building and maintaining relationships. When employees work from home for long periods, or when their days in the office do not overlap with those of other colleagues, these naturally occurring interactions also become less frequent.
For people who have recently moved to Australia, this change may be even more significant. The workplace can sometimes be an important channel for new migrants to engage with Australian society, meet people from different backgrounds and build social networks. If work and daily life are concentrated in the same private space for long periods, opportunities for employees to interact with the outside world may also decrease. These effects cannot necessarily be measured simply in terms of productivity or commuting time.
Face-to-face interaction is particularly important for new employees. People entering the workforce not only need to learn their job responsibilities, but also need to understand how the company operates, the team culture, and how to deal with situations that are not written down in work guidelines. When sitting beside colleagues, they can ask questions immediately and gain experience by observing how more senior colleagues handle situations.
For some jobs and services that require direct contact, face-to-face interaction is even more difficult to replace completely through remote methods. Taking the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) as an example, some services can be provided by phone or online. However, in remote communities, the NDIS still arranges local service teams to regularly provide face-to-face support in the community, and also has community connectors to help participants access services. This shows that technology can reduce the limitations created by distance, but different jobs and services may still require face-to-face forms of interaction.
People Being Left Behind by Digitalisation
WFH also brings another issue. As more work moves online, some services that could previously be handled face to face may also gradually shift towards remote models. Some specialised federal government agencies already have a relatively high proportion of employees working remotely or from home.
For people who are familiar with smartphones, online platforms and video communication, this may simply be a change in the way services are delivered. But for people who are less familiar with digital devices, accessing services may become more difficult as a result. As government departments, businesses and public services increasingly rely on online bookings, electronic forms, telephone services or video communication, tasks that previously only required someone to visit an office in person and explain their situation to a staff member may instead require them to log into a website, find the relevant information, fill in forms and then wait for a response.
Older people are particularly likely to be affected. Even if they own a smartphone or computer, they may not be familiar with the websites and systems used by different government departments and businesses. They may need more time to figure things out, or even rely on family members or friends to handle matters on their behalf. For older people who live alone or lack family support, the impact of reduced face-to-face services may be even more significant.
As some employees gain greater flexibility through remote work, the way services are delivered across society may also change. But this convenience may not be enjoyed equally by everyone. As the government promotes changes to working arrangements, it also needs to consider the needs of these people and ensure that the convenience brought by digitalisation does not ultimately become a burden for some members of the public.
Appeasing Workers While Ignoring Reality
It is difficult to separate the Victorian WFH bill from political considerations. For the Labor Government, “two days of working from home each week” can both respond to employees’ demands for greater flexibility and help shape an image of the government as being on the side of workers. From an electoral perspective, the policy clearly carries an element of appealing to workers and seeking their votes.
The problem is that the political message of protecting workers is easy to promote, while the realities of the workplace are far more complex. If the policy places too much emphasis on “what rights workers should have” without fully considering how businesses can actually operate under the arrangement, it may ultimately become a policy that is popular among workers but generates controversy in its implementation.
Victoria has previously seen examples of a gap between policy ideals and practical implementation. In 2022, the Andrews Government introduced the Sick Pay Guarantee trial, allowing eligible casual and contract workers to receive up to five days of sick and carer’s leave each year. The policy was primarily justified as a way to protect workers and prevent them from having to choose between their income and their health because they did not have access to paid sick leave. However, the scheme was eventually ended in 2024 as part of spending cuts, with the government estimating the total cost of the program at approximately AUD245.6 million.
This example shows that even when policies aimed at protecting workers have a positive starting point, implementation still needs to deal with issues of cost, execution and long-term sustainability. It inevitably raises questions about whether the government had fully considered long-term costs and practical feasibility before introducing the policy, or whether it first responded to political and electoral needs with measures popular among workers and left the subsequent problems to be dealt with later.
The WFH bill also needs to confront the gap between policy ideals and reality. As discussed above, businesses need to deal with a range of practical issues when implementing WFH. If the Labor Government focuses only on the greater flexibility workers can obtain while failing to adequately explain how businesses will bear the impact of these changes, it raises questions about whether the government is simply focused on responding to workers’ demands and seeking votes while overlooking workplace realities.
How Far Should the Government Intervene?
Looking at other parts of the world, governments have taken different approaches to WFH.
Under the current system in the Netherlands, working from home is not itself a legal right. However, eligible employees can formally request a change to their place of work, including partial work from home, under the Flexible Working Act. Employers are required to consider such requests and can refuse them on reasonable business or operational grounds. Ireland has also had a statutory right to request remote work since 2024, giving employees a formal channel to make WFH requests. Employers must consider applications according to an established procedure before making a decision based on the nature of the work and the actual circumstances.
The common approach in both places is for the government to provide basic protections, ensuring that employees have a formal channel through which to make requests, while leaving specific working arrangements to be negotiated between employers and employees. This model gives employees a degree of protection while preserving room for businesses to adjust according to their actual circumstances.
By comparison, the Victorian bill would directly give eligible employees a statutory right to work from home for up to two days a week. This goes beyond protecting an employee’s ability to make a request and involves the government intervening further in actual working arrangements.
The question is whether the government needs to intervene to this extent. Whether WFH can operate effectively depends on the nature of the position, team structure, customer needs and the way a business operates. These conditions are difficult to cover through a single set of legal arrangements. The government can protect an employee’s right to make a reasonable WFH request, but going further and stipulating that eligible employees can work from home for two days a week could turn a working arrangement that would otherwise be negotiated between employers and employees into a legal right directly prescribed by the government.
Such a uniform standard may also overlook the diversity of workplaces themselves. Different positions within the same company can have completely different working arrangements. Large and small businesses also have different management capabilities, and even the same position can have different practical requirements in different companies. When working arrangements themselves vary, a standard established in advance by the government for most eligible employees could limit the ability of businesses and employees to reach arrangements that are more suitable to their individual circumstances.
The Answer to Working Arrangements Still Lies in the Future
In fact, businesses’ attitudes towards WFH continue to evolve after the pandemic. In recent years, a number of major companies, including Amazon, Microsoft and JPMorgan, have gradually tightened or removed some WFH arrangements, requiring employees to spend more time working in physical offices. This reflects the fact that businesses are still working out the balance between remote and office-based work, and that this balance may also change with economic conditions, technological development and management practices.
At the same time, working arrangements may also develop in another direction. In recent years, the rise of “digital nomads” has seen some people work for overseas companies while living in places such as Bali, with their place of work completely separate from the location of their employer and company. This also shows that there is no single fixed answer to how work should be organised.
Technology is also likely to further change this balance. Artificial intelligence, virtual collaboration tools and digital platforms continue to develop. Work that requires face-to-face interaction today may be handled more effectively remotely several years from now. At the same time, businesses may also find that certain types of work still require teams to collaborate in the same physical space. Whether more people will work from home, return to offices, or adopt more diverse working arrangements in the future remains difficult to determine.
Therefore, there may simply be no single standard for how many days employees should work from home or which jobs are suitable for remote work. Rather than having the government establish a fixed arrangement in advance for all businesses and employees, it may be more important to create a fair and flexible framework for negotiation, allowing businesses and employees to adjust according to their actual needs while giving working arrangements room to change alongside the future workplace.