Police officers in Victoria have this week won the "right to disconnect" from work with a new clause that has been officially included into the Victoria Police Enterprise Agreement 2019 (Agreement).
In essence, the clause directs the employer to respect an employee's period of leave and rest days and provides that the employer is not permitted to contact an employee outside of the employee's agreed working hours (unless it is a genuine emergency or welfare matter).
Under the clause, an employee now has the right to refuse to respond or engage with any after hours contact by the employer unless the employee is in receipt of an "availability allowance", which is paid for every hour the employee is off duty and ready to be contacted.
While there is no immediate penalty for an employer who breaches the clause, an employee (or their union) could now take action against their employer to prosecute them for breaching a term of an enterprise agreement if they are inappropriately contacted after hours which could result in the employer being fined (depending on the severity of the breach).
This obviously represents a significant departure from the way in which similar rights have operated (such as those that regulate the maximum weekly hours of work, overtime payments, the span of hours etc) and signals a landmark change to the way in which the boundaries of work are set.
The idea is that from a health and wellbeing perspective, it was critical for the Victorian Police to undergo a cultural shift to ensure that officers can actually 'switch off' after finishing a day of difficult police work. It is almost certain that other industries will follow suit as unions push for similar rights for their members in response to the remarkable changes to the working environment brought about as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is not too far a stretch to expect that claims for personal injury, or a breach of the work health and safety legislation may become more prominent if employers fail to adequately regulate out of hours contact between staff members.
The change is seemingly in line with the way in which the working environment is becoming defined across the developed world as nations such as France and Italy incorporate similar rights into their workplace laws and prominent German organisations into their workplace policies.
Employers in Australia should prepare themselves for the ongoing debate around the establishment of workplace boundaries as pressure around the issue intensifies.
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