Overview

• Australian Services Union will lodge a formal submission with the Fair Work Commission seeking legal protections for working from home where practicable.
• The proposed draft calls for a presumption of approval for remote work requests, a six-month notice period for changes, and mandatory employer responses outlining business grounds for refusals within 14 days.
• The union’s survey of 600 workers, more than two-thirds women, found 98 per cent rate the ability to work from home as extremely or very important.
• Federal Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce warned that AI could automate keyboard-based roles and urged workers to safeguard office attendance to protect their jobs while pointing to trades as less susceptible to automation.
• Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek highlighted that repetitive tasks face the greatest AI threat and called for quality employment in emerging industries as the federal productivity roundtable prepares to address AI’s impact on workplace flexibility.