(Sydney) A right to disconnect law, passed in February in Australia, came into force on Monday for medium and large businesses.
“Today is a historic day for workers,” said Michele O’Neil, president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions.
Australians will be able to “spend quality time with their loved ones without the stress of having to constantly respond to unreasonable work calls and messages,” she added.
Under the new law, employees can now “refuse to monitor, read or respond” to requests from their employers outside of working hours, unless the time limit is “reasonable.”
The Australian Industry Group, an employers’ organisation, has expressed its reservations, calling “right to disconnect” laws “rushed, ill-conceived and deeply confusing”.
“Employers and employees will no longer know whether they can accept or make a call outside of working hours to offer overtime,” she continued.
“We encourage workers to educate themselves about the right to disconnect and take a sensible approach to implementing it in their workplace,” said Anna Booth of the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO), an independent Australian body responsible for ensuring compliance with laws and regulating workplace relationships.
Judging what is reasonable “depends on the circumstances,” the FWO said in a statement. Decisive factors may include, among other things, the reason for the contact or the nature of the employee’s position.
“We want to make sure that because people are not paid 24 hours a day, they don’t have to work 24 hours a day,” Labor Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, whose government implemented the reform, told public television.
“It’s also a mental health issue, frankly, that people can disconnect from their work and connect with their family and their life,” he also said.
Small businesses with fewer than 15 employees have been granted additional time and will be required to comply with the law from August 26, 2025.
The “right to disconnect” came into force in France in 2017, in Spain in 2018 and in Belgium in 2022.