Why Westpac’s WFH loss shows flexibility has gone too farAARON PATRICK: A working mother’s win against Westpac shows just how far the pendulum has swung against employers. 4 min read

7NEWS10-23

Should a mother who chose to move to the countryside and send her young children to a private school two hours from her workplace be required to turn up to the office every week?The industrial umpire ...

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Her argument boiled down to: going to the office would be inconvenient for her life.Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today The Fair Work Commission decision is an example of how far Australia’s industrial relations system has shifted under a Labor government. Employers have lost so much control of their workplaces they can no longer require staff to turn up.No clear explanationWestpac did not help with its lofty treatment of a longstanding and effective employee.Worth $130 billion and employing 35,000 people, the bank should have known better than to reverse, with no clear explanation, a decision to allow Ms Chandler to work the two days from a retail bank branch in the NSW southern highlands town of Bowral, a 30-minute drive from her home in Wilton.What became a dispute of national consequences started, like many things, with a simple request from the bowels of Australia’s oldest bank.Last December Ms Chandler convinced her boss it would be too far to drive to the nearest Westpac office in Parramatta. Under a policy designed to provide flexibility while preserving office culture, Westpac’s new, hard-charging chief executive, Anthony Miller, wanted everyone in the office at least two days a week.Ms Chandler was like countless other parents juggling a job and family. She had two six-year-old children to take to school every day — in the opposite direction to the nearest Westpac office. Her self-employed husband could not pick up the slack because he worked long hours on the road in NSW and interstate.A junior manager, wanting to avoid conflict, allowed Ms Chandler to take the bank branch option.It was a face-saving compromise. As someone who worked in an unglamorous behind-the-scenes job of issuing loans, distributing fees and discharging debts, she had nothing to do with branch tellers. Mixing with them did not help her job.Life choicesWhen a more senior boss returned from leave, the decision was reversed.Westpac decided Ms Chandler’s “life choices”, including where she lives and sends her children to school, should not require the bank to bend its policies. It was not unreasonable to expect Ms Chandler and her husband to cover the cost of childcare, the bank later explained.Many employees would have backed down. Not Ms Chandler, who had been working remotely since the pandemic. She had received high performance ratings and beat deadlines, according to evidence later presented by her union, and had acted as a mentor to less-experienced staff during the lockdowns.With the help of the Finance Sector Union, she demanded the bank justify its decision.It was at this point that Westpac made a mistake.In March one of Ms Chandler’s bosses sent a message stating that “working from home is no substitution for childcare”. He asserted Westpac could choose at any time if she could work at home.A couple of months later the bank ordered Ms Chandler to start working at least two days a week in a corporate office. The decision was to come into effect in January, 2026.New rulesThe principle is surely true. Parenthood does not relieve an employee of their obligation to work. But school lockdowns during COVID made it impractical to force many to choose between employment and childcare.Perceptions of the appropriate split between work and home life shifted. Politics followed. Both main parties now support working from home, despite some employers’ quiet disgust.The new attitude is reflected in changes made by the Labor government in 2023 to the Fair Work Act, which requires employers to genuinely try to reach agreement on changes to working arrangements, including where people work. Employers have to consider the effects of any refusal on the employee, which are inevitably negative.Westpac did neither.Not only did the bank miss the 21-day deadline for responding to her request, its written refusal did not explain the reason for the rejection. Deputy President Thomas Roberts, the lawyer who oversaw the case, was not convinced Westpac seriously considered how its decision would affect Ms Chandler’s life.The clash between attempts to pull workers back to the office, and employees’ expectations of working wherever they want, is driving more cases to the Fair Work Commission.Westpac’s loss in the case demonstrates employers can’t assume they have a right to make staff turn up, according to Professor Andrew Stewart, one of Australia’s top industrial relations academics.“If you’re an employer and you want to shift the line back towards working in the office, you really need to be able to justify the reasons for that,” he told The Nightly.“It is not just a question of you have to show why you believe that’s a good idea. You have to ensure you are being consistent about that. Allowing some staff to work remotely and telling others they can’t (is wrong) — you have to be able to show why there is different treatment.”The long-term consequences are likely to be serious.The empty office will deprive many workers of camaraderie, support and discipline. Friendships will go unformed. Young men and women will be deprived of role models. 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