Public Service Flexibility Dispute Ends in Redundancy

Four Corners reported that 24 women in Australia’s public sector said they faced pregnancy discrimination, from demotions and rejected flexible-work requests to lost promotions. Some said their employers made them redundant or let them go after they became pregnant or took parental leave. More than 100 women told the program they had experienced workplace discrimination after becoming pregnant or having children.

A flexible-work request rejected

Until June, Alisha Warner worked as a counterterrorism senior executive in the Department of Home Affairs. Before taking leave for her second baby, she worked full-time hours over four days under a flexible arrangement.

Warner told Four Corners she was surprised when she asked to return on the same arrangement and managers told her senior executives couldn't work flexibly. “I was really shocked and a bit concerned immediately about what that was going to mean,” she said.

Documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws show Warner's managers sought Human Resources advice about her request to return on compressed hours. The advice said the department had “reasonable business grounds” to reject the request, while acknowledging it was “arguable” that Warner's four-day arrangement “remains in place”.

In an email requesting a response to Warner, a department official wrote: “Confirming the intention is not to support the request, so I'd be grateful for a response on that basis.” The department offered Warner a short transition period, then required her to work five days a week.

Warner said she couldn't secure another day of child care for her children. “I was very strongly given a message that flexible work was not going to be supported anywhere,” she told Four Corners.

The department's explanation

Managers said the counterterrorism role needed five-day coverage because the work had changed. A Home Affairs spokesman said the role's “scope, complexity and sensitivity” had evolved after the Bondi terrorist attack, requiring sustained senior executive oversight, leadership and decision-making. The department therefore couldn't approve compressed hours.

Warner said she had been available on her day off under her previous arrangement if anything critical arose. She had heard assertions about how busy the role was, she said, but received little tangible evidence explaining why the arrangement couldn't continue.

Warner eventually took voluntary redundancy and refused to sign a confidentiality agreement. She said non-disclosure agreements had left some people feeling alone in what had happened to them. “It's not a real choice when you don't feel like you have any other choices,” she said. Leaving a secure senior executive role she had worked hard to obtain filled her with “absolute dread”.

Costs, rights and the complaint

Former assistant commissioner of the Australian Border Force Kylie Rendina said some public-service managers viewed flexible arrangements as too costly. But losing a staff member who needed flexibility could also cost an agency. Replacing an experienced staff member could cost 50 to 200 per cent of an annual salary, analysis showed, she said.

A Home Affairs spokesman denied there was a culture of rejecting flexible work because of cost, while acknowledging cost was a factor. He said the department had to consider staff expenditure within its budget and under the Public Governance Performance and Accountability Act.

Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth said the Australian public service, including the federal government, aimed to be a “model employer”. Taking flexible work shouldn't mean an employee was considered less productive or less valuable, she said, adding that “there is a right for flexible work”.

Warner took action against the Department of Home Affairs in the Fair Work Commission, alleging a breach of flexible-work provisions. Mediation ended without agreement, and she chose not to take the claim to the Federal Court. “I strongly believe in my case, but I also know how much lawyers cost,” she said. Warner said she worried her experience sent a message to women in the public service already thinking they might have to hold themselves back if they wanted children.