Labor’s industrial relations agenda has turned into a farce, and increasingly professional apartheid and prejudice.

Since being re-elected the Federal government has been on the war path on industrial relations. While Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has been talking up productivity, the Industrial Relations Minister, Amanda Rishworth, has been doing her best to kneecap him.

Before the last election the retail sector sought to simplify worker’s wages and give them a 35 per cent pay rise as a trade-off for not having to pay lawyers and accountants to figure out the complexity of their award.

The unions and Labor were having none of it, and instead inflamed a false war claiming it would lead to lower wages and where the only solution was to undermine the flexibility of the industrial empire.

But the Victorian Premier, Jacinta Allan, has taken proxy battles to a whole new level on Sunday with an attempt to weaponise work from home.

Claiming she will introduce public and private sector protections for two days work from home, it took a few lawyers to point out she doesn’t have the power under Federal laws to do so.

In the process of advancing her political agenda she’s risked undermining work from home and created a form of professional apartheid.

Bureaucrats get protected arrangements. Teachers can’t teach from home. Nurses can’t treat patients remotely. Tradies can’t build from behind a desk. Retail workers can’t sell from their spare room. That doesn’t mean they deserve less respect or fewer workplace rights. But under Labor’s plan, that’s exactly what’s happening.

It’s professional apartheid in favour of pay offs for Labor’s friends, paid for by everyone else.

What should be a genuine conversation about modernising our workplaces has become yet another political football and it will be workers that pay the price.

The problem with Labor’s approach to industrial relations is they approach everything through the lens of politics, not the lived reality of small business.

Labor’s approach to industrial relations assumes that every corner store, side hustle and startup has a human resources, legal and finance department to interpret the War and Peace-length industrial relations laws, regulations and case law.

At no point do they seem interested in bringing small business into the conversation, nor their confidence.

Australia needs a serious conversation about improving standards of living, boosting take home pay and promoting genuine workplace flexibility that encourages employees to work with employers toward mutual success, they’re just posturing for votes.

Instead we have politics first, bureaucrats second and teachers, nurses, tradies and everyone else last.

This isn’t about fairness or productivity. It’s about picking winners and losers to appease political allies.

This is the cost of playing proxy political battles: some workers are thrown on the ash heap to serve an agenda. Labor talks about equality, but they’re creating lines between professions. That’s not reform. That’s division.

The Federal Coalition supports workplace flexibility. We recognise that working from home can be a win for everyone. Happy workers can be more productive. Not every job requires people navigating hours of traffic every day.

The real pathway to productivity is not one-size-fits-all solutions. It is when employees and employers find mutually beneficial arrangements that work for them.

By politicising working from home, Labor is putting it at risk. What began as pragmatic during the pandemic is now becoming a wedge. If it becomes a battleground, flexibility won’t survive the crossfire.

Working Australians deserve better than to be used as pawns in political games. They deserve a Government focused on outcomes and on empowering workers, not dividing them.

The Coalition will continue to champion workplace flexibility where it works and is built on common sense. We will stand against policies that divide the workforce, privilege the few and leave others behind.

Call this for what it is, a blatant grenade aimed to ignite a battle. Instead I’d prefer to work through sensible common sense arrangements so we can benefit from the opportunity modernising our work places presents—a better life for all Australians.

Published in the Australian Financial Review, 4 August 2025