4 days ago
Jacinta Allan ushers in entitled 'leaners' culture in working from home legislation that will drive Aussie jobs overseas
A touch over a decade ago, then federal treasurer Joe Hockey was appealing to the 'lifters, not leaners'.
Today, Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan has decided the leaners are the way to go.
She has fired the starting gun on a state election 15 months away by announcing her government will enshrine working from home in legislation.
Those who can 'reasonably' do their jobs from home – the definition of which will, I am sure, later be slogged out in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal – shall be entitled to do so at least two days a week.
I would say Ms Allan is probably commissioning someone to remake The Beatles' 'Eight Days a Week' as a Two Days a Week campaign song but, in 2025, she'd probably get an artificial intelligence bot to do it for nothing.
And that's rather ironic given where this working from home caper is headed.
If your job can be done from home then there's also a good chance that it can either be performed by a foreigner for a fraction of the price or farmed out to an AI bot for next to nothing.
An acquaintance of mine had exactly this argument with his clerical staff a few years ago after Covid lockdowns forced people to work from home.
Some pushed to continue that arrangement – and he told them they were free to stay at home but their jobs would soon be outsourced to someone much cheaper in the Philippines.
Funnily enough, they all came back to the office.
If you want to stay at home, against your employer's wishes, then you're just asking to be replaced.
It is the one thing – apart, perhaps, from trying to understand foreign accents – that makes someone in the office worth employing.
They're right there and you can talk directly to them at any time.
If you can do your job remotely, then someone else can do it remotely, too, for a pittance.
How is it that most people with office jobs spent most of their time in the office without complaint before 2020 but since going through an extraordinary government-mandated circumstance, everyone now expects to be able to work from home as a right?
Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, political participation, trial by jury… and working from home.
If it's written into the terms of your employment contract that you're allowed to work from home then go for your life – you and your boss have come to a fair arrangement.
But if you were never previously allowed to work from home you can either renegotiate your contract or find another job.
It should simply be a matter between employer and employee.
And how interesting that Labor – traditionally the party of the blue-collar workingman – is now rushing to defend the rights of the middle class white collars.
That is what Labor (the clue is meant to be in the name) has become.
So enjoy your right to work from home while it lasts because you may soon find yourself at home full time.
Caleb Bond is the Host of The Sunday Showdown, Sundays at 7.00pm and co-host of The Late Debate Monday – Thursday at 10.00pm as well as a Contributor. Bond also writes a weekly opinion column for The Advertiser
