Working time and managing care under Labor: whose flexibility?

Abstract

Since the Labor Government’s election in 2007, debate around working-time flexibility has continued unabated. Employers argue that increasing employer-orientated flexibility through changes to minimum working-time standards and individual flexibility agreements is the path to enhanced productivity and a more effective economy. Unions and others have focused on the need for greater employee-orientated flexibility to facilitate combining work and care. However, on neither side of the debate has much attention been paid to basic principles that might inform working-time regulation in ways that would enable individual workers to manage their work and care responsibilities better and deliver a more sustainable and gender-equitable economy. The article outlines recent contestation around flexibility and argues that without ensuring adequate minimum working-time standards for all workers, the gendered divide around work and care will continue to be reinforced.