Arriving at a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy in Australia

ABSTRACT

This article examines Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy as a workplace equality and gender equality policy. Drawing on Baird’s typology of policy orientations and systematic process analysis of documents and elite interviews with 43 key informants, this article contributes a process theory of how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia. It finds non-traditional actors (anti-domestic violence advocates, trade union members and researchers) led traditional actors (components of the state, trade unions and employer parties) towards orientations and mechanisms on this policy post-2010 likely to enhance the social equity of employees experiencing domestic violence. Significant to non-traditional actor effectiveness on this was their lived expertise and experience on domestic violence, and trade union support.

KEYWORDS:

• Workplace domestic violence policy
• industrial relations
• policy orientations
• gender equality
• lived expertise
• social equity

This article explains developments in Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy from 1997 to 2022 and their importance for the social equity of employees experiencing domestic violence. It defines government policy as ‘whatever governments choose to do or not to do’ (Dye 2012, 12) and workplace domestic violence policy as a type of policy to promote equality and gender equality at work, recognising domestic violence causes complex inequalities in public and private domains, and significantly more so for women (Walby 2009, 2020). In Australia at the beginning of 2010 no employee entitlement to workplace domestic violence leave and supports existed in Australian statutes, awards, or agreements (Baird et al. 2014; Ellicott 2021) and unlikely existed in individual employee contracts. The idea of paid domestic violence leave was nascent. There was a disjunct between Australian Government policy on domestic violence and industrial relations policy. This was despite considerable international and Australian research establishing the high cost of domestic violence to workplaces and poor social equity outcomes for employees experiencing domestic violence (e.g., see Costello et al. 2005). Australian Government policy prior to 2010 was to address domestic violence largely through uncoordinated welfare and criminal and family law systems which ill provided for the long-term social equity and safety of domestic violence victim-survivors (e.g., Wilcox 2010). However, Australian Government policy changed radically on domestic violence in 2010 with the then Government’s abrupt and unheralded support for the development of domestic violence leave entitlements via collective bargaining (Department of Social Services 2014a, 16–17). By the end of 2013, of Australia’s then approximately 11,628,300 employees (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2013), over one million had access to workplace domestic violence leave entitlements in workplace agreements and awards and the job protections these offered (Department of Social Services 2014b, 7). Australian Government policy on domestic violence changed dramatically again with the introduction of domestic violence terms into Australia’s National Employment Standards (NES) in 2013 (the right to request flexible working arrangements for employees experiencing domestic violence) and in 2018 and 2022 for unpaid and paid domestic violence leave respectively (Parliament of Australia 2022). This rapid movement (over the relatively short space of time of twelve years) towards universal employee access to statutory paid domestic violence leave entitlements, is remarkable given the slow progress historically of policy aimed at advancing equality and gender equality at work (e.g., Baird 2011; Whitehouse 2004). Yet, to date, there has been little analysis of how and why the Australian Government embarked on a workplace entitlements response to domestic violence or of the consequences of these entitlements for the social equity of employees experiencing domestic violence. This article addresses these knowledge gaps. They are important to address, given the continued critical nature of domestic violence (Hoeffler 2017), the projected ongoing high cost of domestic violence to Australian workplaces and society (Department of Social Services 2016) and the potential of government policy and workplace legislation to ameliorate such costs (e.g., Baird 2004).

The article addresses these gaps via answering the research question: how and why did Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy develop and to what extent did traditional (components of the state, trade unions and employer parties) and non-traditional actors influence it? The analysis employs the overarching theoretical lens of Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology of policy orientations and concepts arrived at from the literature. The typology was proposed to conceptualise Australian Government ‘policy paralysis’ (Baird 2004, 259) on universal paid maternity and parental leave provision and envisage a way out of it. An obvious relevance of the typology to analysis of workplace domestic violence policy is that the latter too was subject to ‘policy paralysis’ prior to 2010 yet appears to have overcome it. This article builds on the typology to explain the process through which post-2010 non-traditional actors influenced traditional actors to arrive at a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy with paid domestic violence leave its optimal mechanism. In doing so it extends the type of ‘principal agency’ (Baird 2004, 269) inherent in the typology to include specific types of non-traditional actors (anti-domestic violence advocates, trade union members and researchers) and defines ‘primary mechanisms’ (Baird 2004, 269) needed to progress social equity on this policy. It argues that anti-domestic violence advocates’ input of lived expertise and experience on domestic violence was vital (and will continue to be vital) to the process of arriving at a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy.

The article proceeds by first developing its conceptual framework through reviewing existing relevant literature to determine what it can tell us on how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia. It then sets out its method and findings from its study of the Australian Government’s changing orientations on workplace domestic violence policy. The findings are then discussed, and conclusions drawn. Table 1. at the end of the article provides an overview of significant Australian Government and state and territory workplace domestic violence policy events and outcomes from 1997 to 2022. This article concludes that the overall reason for the policy’s development was its principal actors’ quest for social equity for domestic violence victim-survivors. Appendix 1. provides interview participant details.

Table 1. Timeline of significant events and policy outcomes in workplace domestic violence policy development in Australia.

1997	Coalition Government (Cth) establishes Partnerships Against Domestic Violence Program
2009	Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) operative from June
2010	Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project funded by the Commonwealth DEEWR First paid domestic violence leave clause negotiated in an enterprise agreement
2011	First National Plan to Reduce Violence Against Women & their Children 2010–2022 February: NSW Public Service staff entitled to domestic violence leave via Crown Employees (Public Service Conditions of Employment) Award 2009 ALRC recommends including domestic violence leave in enterprise agreements, modern awards and the NES AHRC canvasses domestic violence as a separate ground for discrimination
2012	ACTU policy for domestic violence to be included as a ground for the right to request flexible working arrangements in the NES Northern Territory public sector employees granted paid and uncapped domestic violence leave via Miscellaneous Leave (By-law 18)
2013	NES right to request flexible working arrangements expanded to include employees impacted by domestic violence via Fair Work Amendment Bill 2013 (Cth) Dec: Tasmanian public servants entitled to use leave if impacted by domestic violence WGEA requires employers to report on employee domestic violence provisions in place
2014	ACT public sector employees formally entitled to domestic and family violence leave
2015	ACTU claim for paid domestic violence leave in modern awards begins circa 2014–2015 Anti-domestic violence campaigner Rosie Batty made Australian of the Year Victorian Royal Commission into Family Violence begins 13-month enquiry November: South Australian and Queensland public servants eligible for paid domestic violence leave December: VIC announces 20 days of paid family violence leave for public sector permanent employees and unpaid leave for casual employees ALP pledges 5 days of paid domestic violence leave in the NES if elected in 2016 Australian Public Service Commission bargaining policy prohibits new domestic violence leave entitlements
2016	WGEA Employer of Choice eligibility requirement for employers to offer domestic violence provisions Productivity Commission recommends acting to include domestic violence leave in the NES should wait until the Fair Work Commission modern awards decision
2017	August: Western Australia announces 10 days of paid domestic violence leave for public servants Nov: ACTU launches We Won’t Wait campaign for 10 days paid domestic violence leave in NES; Australian Greens propose bill for NES to include 10 days of paid domestic violence leave December: ALP commits to 10 days of paid domestic violence leave in the NES
2018	August: 5 days of unpaid domestic violence leave come into effect in modern awards Australian Public Service employees can access paid personal, carers or miscellaneous leave for domestic violence November: NSW public servants entitled to 10 days of paid domestic violence leave, from 1 January 2019 12 December: 5 days of unpaid domestic violence leave included in the NES via the Fair Work Amendment (Family and Domestic Violence Leave) Bill 2018 (Cth)
2022	9 November: Fair Work Amendment (Paid Family and Domestic Violence Leave) Bill 2022 (Cth) 10 days of paid domestic violence leave enshrined in the NES

Key: ACTU – Australian Council of Trade Unions; ALP – Australian Labor Party; ALRC – Australian Law Reform Commission; AHRC - Australian Human Rights Commission; DEEWR – Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations; NES – National Employment Standards; WGEA – Workplace Gender Equality Agency.

Table 1. is reproduced & updated with permission of the copyright owner, Ellicott (2021:61)

Conceptual framework

The literature review interrogates studies from industrial relations and related disciplines for empirical and theoretical answers therein relevant to answering the research questions. It identifies what was known about how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed prior to this current study. First it reviews existing studies on workplace domestic violence policy development. It then consults studies of workplace gender equality policy change in other policy areas for insights therein into workplace domestic violence policy reform.

Workplace domestic violence policy studies

Empirically, studies reviewed indicated the significant input of researchers, anti-domestic violence advocates and trade unions into workplace domestic violence policy reform. For example, Widiss (2008) highlights how researchers reframed domestic violence as a public rather than a private issue in the USA. Researchers producing an evidence-based survey (McFerran et al. 2018) and backing unions (Weatherall et al. 2021) were a force behind national paid domestic leave legislation in the Philippines (2004) and New Zealand (2018) respectively. McFerran et al. (2018) and Weatherall et al. (2021) revealed how trade unions progressed workplace domestic violence leave entitlements, and in conjunction with anti-domestic violence advocates. However, it is not known from these studies how these partnerships or coalitions transpired given that prior to their formation their actors’ pursuits were likely autonomous. Empirically, also, the Australian evidence does not account for beyond circa 2017 (McFerran et al. 2018).

Theoretically, the literature reviewed diverged on how and why workplace domestic violence policy progressed. In the context of the USA, one idea was that state provision of workplace domestic violence leave and supports was occasioned by employer neglect on this (Swanberg et al. 2012). Somewhat in contrast, Weissman (2016) proposed government macroeconomic and business goal prioritisation delayed workplace domestic violence policy and entitlements development in that country. Early national government commitment to international standards of gender-based violence is given as a further reason for workplace domestic violence policy progress (McFerran et al. 2018, in the context of the Philippines). But these studies could not account for the rapidity of workplace domestic violence policy reform in Australia.

Studies of barriers to workplace gender equality

The literature reviewed showed considerable barriers to workplace gender equality policy reform (Heery 2016). It identified overlapping organisational (Baird 2016; Pocock 2008), social norm (Pocock and Charlesworth 2017), regulatory (Acker 1990; Baird 2011; Castles 1994) and research (e.g., Rubery et al. 2018) barriers to policy promoting gender equality at work. Such barriers were shown in these studies to result in individualist approaches to policy reform, where individuals foremost bear the costs of forming (for example, through workplace contracts) and upholding such rights (e.g., Boyle and Roan 2004). Studies argued forms of collectivism (collective bargained agreements, employee awards and workplace legislation) were needed to counter this (e.g., Whitehouse and Frino 2003). They highlighted how advances to workplace gender equality were hampered when researchers and policymakers neglected to consider the intersection of work, home, and the community (e.g., Baird 2008; Pocock and Charlesworth 2017). One view of how and why policy aimed at promoting gender equality progressed was that such progress was only tolerated if resultant costs to employers were small and male breadwinner, ideal male worker models remained relatively intact (Votinius 2006).

Studies of traditional actor progress on workplace gender equality

On traditional actors, the literature reviewed revealed government (Sawer and Turner 2016) and trade union (Briskin 2014) actor conservatism regarding gender equality. It showed that they at large privileged male breadwinner (Castles 1994) and ideal male actor norms (Acker 1990). Regarding the state, Sawer and Turner (2016, 766) identified how party interests constrained workplace equality policy progress and how women’s policy machinery (women formulating policy from within and outside of parliaments) countered this. Studies reviewed (e.g., Briskin 2014; Ellem 2013; Forbes-Mewett and Snell 2006; Parker 2011) showed how women in trade unions gradually whittled away obstacles to workplace equality progress. Other studies showed these efforts could be strengthened in coalition with community and civil organisations (Parker 2011; Tattersall 2005). Cooper et al. (2015) highlighted how trade unions were more likely to influence governmental policy under centre-left governments. These findings, however, did not account for periods of rapid change as had happened on workplace domestic violence policy in Australia.

A review of the literature revealed scholarship was scarce on employer party contribution towards workplace gender equality policy (Woolcock and Jerrard 2009). On workplace equality policy in general, Barry and You (2018) and Demougin et al. (2019) showed that, to remain relevant to their members, employer associations developed a service provider function and activity in policy spheres, including on equality issues. Gooberman et al. (2020) found employer associations stressed employer prerogative as optimal when addressing workplace gender equality issues. Whether the above insights on employer parties bear out in relation to workplace domestic violence policy development in Australia is considered in this article’s analysis.

Dynamic forces of change and non-traditional actors

Recent industrial relations scholarship revealed limitations of analysis which singularly considered traditional actor input into workplace change (e.g., McLaughlin and Wright 2018; Wilkinson and Wood 2012). Studies reviewed found such analytical deficiencies could be avoided by studying non-traditional actor contribution to such change (e.g., Bellemare 2000; Conley 2012; Dabscheck 1980; Heery and Frege 2006; Kaufman 2004; Michelson et al. 2008), including those of key individuals (Kaine 2016; Lawrence et al. 2011). This article counters that prior to its analysis, non-traditional actor contribution to workplace domestic violence policy change in Australia had received little scholarly attention.

Policy orientations

Given the limitations of scholarship reviewed above for explaining the puzzle of how and why domestic violence policy developed in Australia, and apparently so rapidly, the article looked for overarching theory to guide its analysis. Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology, with its clear and compelling definitions of policy orientations and the dominant discourse, principal agents, primary mechanisms and expected outcomes associated with each one (Baird 2004, 269), appeared apt. It is one of the few attempts in industrial relations scholarship to conceptualise the progress (or lack thereof) of policy to advance gender equality at work. It consists of three policy orientations – welfare, business, and bargaining. To paraphrase Baird, a welfare orientation supported the male breadwinner/female dependent model, governments were its principal agents and legislation was its primary mechanism. A business orientation privileged employer prerogative and employer policy was the expected outcome, whereas a bargaining orientation focused on both employee and employer needs, trade unions and employers were its principal agents, and arbitration and negotiation were its primary mechanisms leading to awards and enterprise agreements. To overcome that these orientations had not led to universal paid parental leave for Australian employees, Baird (2016, 57), drawing on feminist scholarship (e.g., Colling and Dickens 1989, 1998; Dickens 1994), proposed a fourth social equity policy orientation which:

would allow women’s differences from men (in terms of childbearing and raising), as well as their need for equality with men (in terms of their personal work and economic interests), to be affirmed and legitimated.

Social equity in this article refers to principles of justice and fairness. These are difficult to define given their normative component where fairness and justice are contingent on personal viewpoint (McSherry 2013). For example, someone aligning with a welfare orientation may believe it fair to expect women (as mothers) to automatically assume primary responsibility for caring for children and any associated loss of or inability to gain financial independence. Baird’s (2016, 57) definition makes it clear that such an orientation and views are unfair to women. The idea of social equity has a long history, for example, inherent in ideas on the social contract from Enlightenment philosophers (e.g., Rousseau 1762). The social contract, rudimentarily put, is the (unwritten, fundamental) agreement between a state and its subjects whereby the state’s legitimacy depends on it providing for its subjects’ social equity (for example, via regulation). This article develops concepts of a social equity orientation (and social contract obligations), principal agents and primary mechanisms to explain how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia. Use of the typology enables the article to claim external validity in that the orientations outlined are potentially applicable to many cases of workplace policy change, and construct validity given its well-defined concepts.

Methods

The article’s data are from its author’s large in scope (time, actor, and evidence-wise) and scale (e.g., local, state and territory, and national government-wise) empirical study of Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy development (Ellicott 2021). The study used a qualitative systematic process analysis approach (modelled on Hall, 2008). This assisted to meet its aim to find causes of policy change given that focus on process (rather than on relationships between variables) enables causal inferences to be drawn (Maxwell 2012, 658). This allows the article to claim internal validity – the extent to which an identified cause equals an effect (Whitfield and Strauss 2008). Qualitative methods are suited to answering ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions in non-experimental settings (Yin, 2014: 9) such as this study poses. The study searched for phenomenon displaying causal complexity like strategic interactions, alternative pathways to the same outcome, and tipping points (Bennett & Elman, 2006: 251). Data comprised of documents, the content of workplace awards, agreements and statutes, and interview transcripts from interviews with 43 research participants involved in workplace domestic violence policy development. From the interviews the study sought to understand actors’ physical (actions and strategies) and mental (motives and orientations to policy) processes (Maxwell 2012, 658). Interview participants were able to provide such information via their reflections and observations on historic policy events and processes. These observations and reflections assisted in recognising Australian Government orientations on this policy, which in turn helped to answer how and why workplace domestic violence policy progressed. It was through qualitative analysis of detailed texts (set out above), that the dominant discourse, principal agency, and primary mechanisms of various different orientations on workplace domestic violence policy could be determined. From the literature reviewed, the speed of these orientation changes was atypical in comparison to the impeded progress of other organisational and governmental policies. Atypical cases are ripe for theory testing and generation (Rapley 2014, 53), such as here where the article tests extant theory of workplace domestic violence policy change against empirical evidence and generates new theory on it based on Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology. It does this via abductive reasoning, taking concepts from its literature review and applying them to new data to ascertain their explanatory power (e.g., see Bryman and Bell 2015, 27). However, the article employed quantitative data analysis when needed to answer the question of the extent of employer influence on the policy. This was via bivariate analysis (Bryman and Bell 2015, 351) of Workplace Gender Equality Agency data (requested and analysed by the article’s author specifically for this study). The article rationalises integrating qualitative and quantitative methods through operationalising pragmatism (a dialectic philosophy that does not commit to any absolutist world view) in order to answer the research question more completely.

The study took place in two stages. First institutions and actors involved in this policy’s development were mapped using the search term ‘domestic violence’ via Factiva database and the specialised employment relations news source Workplace Express. From this, policy events and interview participants involved in workplace domestic violence policy development were identified and invited to participate in the research via interviews. The purpose of the interviews was to assist in empirically and theoretically determining how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia – and what such developments meant for employees experiencing domestic violence. Participants were contacted through their publicly available email addresses and passive snowball sampling (Bryman and Bell 2015, 434–436). The 43 interview participants included traditional actors Australian Commonwealth and State parliamentarians and staffers, Australian Sex Discrimination Commissioners, union peak body presidents, branch secretaries and officials, employer association CEOs and officials and employer diversity and inclusion and human resource managers (set out in Appendix. 1). Non-traditional actor participants included anti-domestic violence advocates and Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project actors, some with research roles. Including this wide variety of actors from within and outside of parliaments facilitated understanding of the ‘black box of causality’ (Trampusch and Palier 2016), in this case the mystery of how and why Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy radically developed in 2010. From the mapping exercise it was evident trade unions were instrumental in early promulgation of workplace domestic violence policy entitlements. Trade union officials involved in early collective bargaining of domestic violence leave entitlements were the first to be invited to participate in the research, and anti-domestic violence advocate Ludo McFerran (from the mapping exercise and interviews with trade union officials), the originator of paid domestic violence leave. All participants were asked the same or comparable questions, starting with the open-ended question, ‘please tell me about your role in the development of workplace domestic violence policy and entitlements?’ Interviews lasted 25 to 90 minutes depending on participant availability. Documentation on this policy (for example, from Hansard documents, Commonwealth State and Territory ministerial speeches, press releases, Acts of Parliament, public sector awards and media reports of workplace domestic violence policy outcomes and events) was progressively collected as were survey data (e.g., from the Workplace Gender Equality Agency). Stage two comprised of analysis of this data. The author transcribed and hand coded the interviews. Interview and documentary evidence were thematically analysed (Vromen 2018, 247) based on themes guided by the study’s actors and policy orientations framework and emergent themes from the empirical data. The various data sources and analyses assisted in triangulating the findings. The research was approved by The University of Sydney’s Human Research Ethics Committee, protocol number 2019/425.

Findings

Findings are set out as a chronology of Australian Government orientations and outcomes on workplace domestic violence policy from 1997 to July 2022. They pinpoint motivations and strategies of actors influencing these orientations and events. Interview participants are identified in the findings by number (e.g., ‘P.1’ = Participant One), reflecting the order in which they were interviewed. However, one key individual participant is named given their importance to paid workplace domestic violence leave development. Appendix 1. sets out participants’ roles in this policy’s development.

1997-2010: A business orientation emerges

In this era the Australian Government appears to have outsourced its social contract responsibility on employees experiencing domestic violence to businesses. Few businesses, however, assumed this responsibility (P. 1; Murray and Powell 2008). The centre-right Australian Government, in office from March 1996 to December 2007, founded the Partnerships Against Domestic Violence (PADV) Program, operative out of the Office of the Status of Women until 2003 (Australian Women’s Timeline, n.d.). The program included business outreach to encourage employers to adopt philanthropic and corporate social responsibility approaches to domestic violence (Murray and Powell 2008). One participant (P.17) who attended a PADV event reflected it was the first time they had ‘heard some really good research on how domestic violence affects workplaces as well as how it affects so many people’. Such research provided empirical evidence of the need to alleviate the costs of domestic violence through coordinated processes and systems, including a workplace response (e.g., see Costello et al. 2005), which the Government omitted to act on. The program provided funding to establish the research body, the Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearinghouse at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) from 1999 to 2014. Its remit included workplace research (e.g., see Murray and Powell 2007, 2008). However, Commonwealth Government support for progressive research on domestic violence appeared tokenistic in the early 2000s given its parliamentarians’ overall reluctance to act on it. The PADV Program provides a snapshot of the Australian Commonwealth Government’s then blended welfare/business orientation on workplace domestic violence policy in which businesses were deemed its principal agents and voluntary employer policies were the result. It was an individualist approach which could lead to employees losing their jobs as a result of domestic violence becoming financially dependent on state welfare or unreliable male breadwinners. Australian Government domestic violence and industrial relations policies at this time lacked consideration of domestic violence victims’ roles as breadwinners and the importance of a job (Showalter 2016) to their ability to leave a violent relationship and protect their children from it.

2009-2010: Transitioning from a business to a bargaining orientation

By the mid-2000s it became apparent to anti-domestic violence advocates that a laissez-faire business orientation on this policy and employer policies were failing to protect the safety, jobs, well-being, and long-term prosperity of victims of domestic violence, primarily women (P.1). Interview participant Ludo McFerran (P.1), who holds decades of lived expertise on domestic violence from working with victim-survivors since the mid-1970s, recognised that welfare and criminal law systems were similarly flawed. McFerran gave the example of magistrates hearing domestic violence matters frequently applying an archaic legal principle, a man’s home is his castle, to their deliberations allowing the male perpetrator to remain in the home, rather than the female victim. McFerran observed how these women could lose their jobs if they did not have a ‘good boss,’ and the consequences of job loss for them, such as homelessness. She highlighted how the inaugural Australian Bureau of Statistics Personal Safety Survey (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006) assisted to overcome this. McFerran recalled it was ‘an incredibly important piece of data for us [for herself and fellow anti-domestic violence advocates]’ as it showed that 62.9% of the women surveyed who were experiencing domestic violence were in the paid workforce. It confirmed for McFerran her observation that, ‘domestic violence could happen to anybody’. Anti-domestic violence advocates, including McFerran had been invited to work with CEOs on the PADV Program. ‘Everyone patted themselves on the back … but [employer support for employee victims of domestic violence] stayed discretionary (P.1).’ This led McFerran to conceive of the need for paid workplace domestic violence leave entitlements (P.1). Trade union and workplace leaders and officials involved in workplace domestic violence policy and entitlements development from 2008 to 2012 and onwards interviewed for this research acknowledged McFerran as the first person to have the idea of this type of leave and highlighted how she had promulgated it to them (P’s 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14 & 42). McFerran and these actors, portrayed paid domestic violence leave as an idea whose time had come. The empirical evidence above shows the process of transition towards a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy – due to McFerran’s lived expertise on domestic violence and imagining of paid domestic violence leave entitlements as a new primary mechanism for addressing it.

2010–13: Centre-left government promoting of workplace entitlements orientations

This section further elucidates the process through which non-traditional actors led traditional actors towards a social equity orientation on this policy. Important to this development were Australian Labor Party (ALP) centre-left Governments’ (in office from December 2007 to September 2013) sweeping industrial relations reforms culminating in The Fair Work Act, 2009 (Cth), containing the National Employment Standards (NES) and modern awards. Anti-domestic violence advocates (evidenced, e.g., by P’s 1, 12, 15, 20, 23, 28, & 35) and Australian Law Reform Commission (Australian Law Reform Commission 2011) and trade union actors were later (as set out below) able to influence lawmakers and the quasi-judiciary to add new primary mechanisms to these new workplace regulatory structures to advance a social equity workplace entitlements orientation for employees experiencing domestic violence.

The NSW Public Service Association, Victorian Trades Hall Council, and the Australian Services Union (Victorian and Tasmanian Branch) (P’s 1, 7, 11, 14, 15, 42) impacted the early development of workplace domestic violence entitlements in Australia. The motivation and strategy of these actors in bargaining for domestic violence leave entitlements was to improve social equity outcomes for employees experiencing domestic violence (P’s 1, 7, 11, 14, 15, 42). This was after McFerran had introduced her idea of paid domestic violence leave to them (Ellicott 2021, 66). Trade union actors driving these developments were women (P’s. 1, 7, 11, 14, 15, 42). Their work included developing a model paid domestic violence leave clause in conjunction with McFerran for use in collective bargaining. All types of employees (including part-time and casual), and men and women were to be eligible for the leave, enhancing the entitlements as a form of collectivism. Trade union members learning of the idea of paid domestic violence leave at union meetings (e.g., from McFerran) put pressure on union officials to bargain for paid domestic violence leave (P. 11). They complained they would forgo their memberships if the union did not proceed with this bargaining (P.11). In 2010 the Government responded to the advocacy and strategies of anti-domestic violence advocates and unions (such as staging a high-profile event to launch the new leave clause) and provided funding to establish the Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project, auspiced by the Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearinghouse. Julia Gillard was Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations at the time. McFerran recalled Gillard’s chief of staff asked McFerran, in partnership with trade unions, to put in a submission for the funding, which they did. Afterwards McFerran recalled, the chief of staff:

got straight back in touch and said, [on paid domestic violence leave] it’s a great idea, tell all the unions to stop ringing us.

The Project’s purpose was to encourage unions and employers to include domestic violence leave in enterprise agreements. The Project developed resources for employer implementation of domestic violence leave and supports. For example, its ‘Domestic Violence and the Workplace’ is still an on-line resource (Australian Human Rights Commission 2022). Project actors incentivised bargaining and provided training on domestic violence leave implementation (P’s 1 & 7). They undertook research such as the ‘Safe at Home, Safe at Work? National Domestic Violence and the Workplace Survey, 2011’, which garnered evidence to support the Project’s objectives (Gendered Violence Research Network, 2011), for example, to achieve reform of workplace and anti-discrimination laws on domestic violence. In 2010 the then Australian Government made funding of the Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project a stipulation of the First National Plan to Reduce Violence Against Women and their Children 2010 to 2022 (the National Plan). Funding of the Project was the first time an Australian Government had endorsed an industrial relations entitlements component in response to domestic violence (Department of Social Services 2014a, 16–17). It was a major breakthrough towards a social equity orientation on this policy, brought about through trade union and non-traditional actor partnerships. Early adopters of enterprise bargained domestic violence leave clauses were regional councils in the Australian state of Victoria (Baird et al. 2014; Ellicott 2021, 93), Australian state and territory public services (see Table 1. at the end of the article) and the Victorian Rail Tram and Bus Union (RTBU). On the latter, certain of its women members negotiated alongside the RTBU to achieve paid domestic violence leave in RTBU collectively bargained agreements (P. 11). With rare exceptions (for example the National Australia Bank amongst big business), trade unions instigated bargaining for domestic violence leave and supports (P.7).

Recognising that some domestic violence leave clauses were sub-par in comparison to the model clause and that not all employers bargained nor were willing to include domestic violence leave entitlements in their enterprise agreements, Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project actors encouraged the Australian Government (for example, in meetings with the Federal Parliamentary Labor Party’s Status of Women Committee and submissions to Parliament) to include paid domestic violence leave provisions in Australia’s NES. In this, they were acting on the recommendation of the Australian Law Reform Commission (Australian Law Reform Commission 2011). This was to be via the Fair Work Amendment Bill 2013 (Cth) (P’s 1 & 7). Only the lesser entitlement of the right to request flexible working arrangements for employees experiencing domestic violence was included in the Bill and enacted. Project actors interviewed (P’s. 7 & 29) expressed disappointment that the Project was disbanded in mid-2013 without having achieved its aims of paid domestic violence leave in the NES, and for domestic violence to become grounds in anti-discrimination law and a term in Occupational Health and Safety laws. McFerran outlined how she had expressed concern over the defunding of the Project to the Minster responsible:

[The Minister] said, ‘you’ve done well … Thanks Ludo, go home and put your feet up’. And I said, ‘what’s the plan? Because who’s going to oversee this? Who is going to make sure it [policy on workplace domestic violence entitlements] is well implemented? That research is kept up to date? There are a whole lot of emerging issues, like what to do with perpetrators.

Members of this Government interviewed reflected that there was no groundswell of public nor trade union support for legislated paid domestic violence leave entitlements at that time (P’s 20, 35). Nevertheless, including domestic violence terms in the NES via the enactment of the Fair Work Amendment Bill 2013 was a significant breakthrough in Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy as it was the first time such terms had been added to national workplace legislation.

2013-17: Centre-right government foregrounding of welfare and business orientations

The incoming September 2013 Coalition Government reverted to its predecessor Coalition Government’s overtly business orientation on workplace domestic violence policy. It dismantled the Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearinghouse, which had been at the forefront of research into workplace response to domestic violence in Australia (Murray and Powell 2007, 2008) and replaced it in 2014 with a new research body, Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS). The latter had a limited workplace focus until recently (Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety 2019). Any workplace focus was removed from The National Plan, again ignoring the evidence on the importance of the workplace to the long-term social equity of victim-survivors.

Employers and employer associations, initially resistant to a workplace entitlements orientation on this policy (P.7; Australian Law Reform Commission 2011), gradually came to accept the validity of domestic violence leave, especially after the low cost of the leave to employers became apparent as time wore on (P.27; Stanford 2016). In 2010 the then Sex Discrimination Commissioner started the Male Champions of Change (now Champions of Change Coalition) to advance workplace gender equality. In 2015 anti-domestic violence advocates Rosie Batty, as Australian of the Year, and Kristy McKellar were invited to speak to Champions of Change groups, convincing certain CEO group members to provide paid domestic violence to their employees (P.2; Male Champions of Change 2015). However, despite such advances, as Figure 1. shows, by early 2018 only approximately 17% of private sector employers reporting to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency provided their employees with paid domestic violence leave.

Figure 1. Growth of private sector paid domestic violence leave entitlements 2015 to 2018.

Source: Produced from data requested from the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) and analysed by the researcher for this study. The figure shows percentages (vertical axis on left) and numbers (vertical axis on right) of employers reporting to WGEA providing paid domestic violence leave entitlements from 2015 to 2018 (data on horizontal axis). Key: PLVEA = Paid domestic violence leave. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner (Ellicott 2021, 122)

Certain employer associations atypically supported the introduction of paid domestic violence leave in modern awards (the National Retail Association, since its members’ staff were highly impacted by domestic violence [P.25]) and the NES (the Victorian Hospital’s Industrial Association, given its members had developed expertise in workplace response to domestic violence [P.43]). It finds that as employers, Australian Coalition Governments after September 2013 resisted appeals (including from the Australian Human Rights Commission [Towell 2016]) for paid domestic violence leave to be made available to Australian Public Service employees. From 2015 onwards pressure was brought to bear on successive Coalition Governments to change their hard-line business orientation on workplace domestic violence policy. This was from the trade union movement (Australian Council of Trade Unions 2015), and anti-domestic violence advocates including Rosie Batty (Hawley et al. 2018). Trade union pressure came from the Australian Council of Trade Union’s 2014 to 2018 claim before the Fair Work Commission to include ten days of paid domestic violence leave in modern awards and We Won’t Wait Campaign for this same leave entitlement in the NES. The campaign originated with the Australian Services Union (NSW & ACT Branch), aiming through it to provide NSW community sector employees with such leave (P.12). The 2017 Victorian Royal Commission into Family Violence (inspired by high profile domestic violence leave cases such as Rosie Batty’s) also recommended the inclusion of domestic violence leave in the NES (Victorian Government 2020). Anti-domestic violence advocates with lived experience of domestic violence had given evidence of the need for paid domestic violence leave entitlements to the Fair Work Commission on modern awards (P.16; Fair Work Commission 2017) and to the Victorian Government and its agencies in the above Royal Commission (Victorian Government 2020). Despite during this time that the cause of social equity for employees experiencing domestic violence was set back by the Coalition’s reversion to male breadwinner ideals, the movement towards a social equity orientation started by Ludo McFerran and progressed by other anti-domestic violence advocates and trade unions had taken hold, and progress towards new domestic violence leave entitlements in modern awards was underway before the Fair Work Commission.

2018: Veering towards a social equity orientation

Given the Coalition Government’s staunch business orientation on this policy pre-2018, what can explain its abrupt turnaround to enact five days of unpaid domestic violence leave in the NES in December 2018? The immediate catalyst was the Fair Work Commission’s decision to include the leave in modern awards (Fair Work Commission 2017). Also, by that time the Commonwealth Government was an outlier in its policy stance. For instance, all Australian state and territory governments had by then provided paid domestic violence leave to their public service employees (see Table 1). The Minister for Jobs and Industrial Relations in 2018 was a woman who identified with feminism (Murphy 2018) and there was strong support for unpaid domestic violence leave in the NES from the business community (reflected in their submissions to the Senate Inquiry into the above Bill). Non-government political parties the Australian Greens and ALP policies were for 10 days of paid domestic violence leave in the NES. Nevertheless, these parties supported the Bill for unpaid leave as a step towards paid leave (P’s. 20, 23, 26, 35, 36). The percentage of female Members of Parliament in these parties was significantly higher than in the Coalition (Hough 2016). The issue of the cost to small business and its unequal (to big business) capacity to pay for the leave entitlements was a sticking point in the Government’s decision not to include paid leave (Smart Company 2017). Nevertheless, a shift towards a social equity orientation had occurred given via the Bill domestic violence leave (albeit unpaid) was conferred on all employees covered by the Fair Work System.

2022: Arriving at a social equity orientation

In May 2022 a new Commonwealth ALP Government was elected and almost immediately brought the Fair Work Amendment (Paid Family and Domestic Violence Leave) Bill 2022 for the inclusion of ten days of paid domestic violence leave in the NES, passed in November 2022. The Bill’s enactment followed the Fair Work Commission’s May 2022 tentative decision to include a ten-day paid domestic violence leave entitlement in modern awards (Fair Work Commission 2022). The leave is to become available to all non-national system employees when Australia ratifies International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention C. 190 – Violence and Harassment, 2019. An unresolved social equity issue raised in 2018 is whether provision of paid domestic violence leave will unfairly burden small business, given 35.4% of small business owner/managers are women who may be facing domestic violence themselves (Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman, 2020, 19). The Senate Education and Employment Committee inquiring into the Bill recommended that the Australian Government commission an independent review of the provisions of the Bill 18 months after it comes into force in February 2023 (Parliament of Australia, 2022). This latest Bill (since it stipulates paid leave for full-time, part-time, and casual employees and a transition period for small business) provides more for the social equity of employees and employers than previous such Bills. It and all major workplace domestic violence policy events and regulatory outcomes in Australia are set out in Table 1. at the end of the article.

Discussion

This article’s objectives were to understand how and why workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia and traditional and non-traditional actor influence on this. It used the overarching lens of Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology of orientations and concepts from the literature to analyse its findings. In this it discovers the remarkable contribution of non-traditional actors in shifting the dial on Australian Government workplace domestic violence policy orientation from a business/welfare orientation to a bargaining orientation to a workplace statutory entitlements orientation. With each new shift greater possibilities for improved social equity for employees experiencing domestic violence arose. When a business orientation was to the fore on this policy pre-2010 employers could use their discretion not to support employees experiencing domestic violence, increasing these employees’ chances of job loss and dependency on welfare sources for their livelihoods. In this sense a business and a welfare orientation were strongly associated. When a bargaining orientation arose post-2010, gradually a greater proportion of Australian workers acquired the right to forms of domestic violence leave entitlement through workplace agreements. But not all employees could access such agreements and agreements have an end date and require renegotiating thereafter. Whereas with the rise of paid domestic violence leave terms in the NES the majority of Australian employees will have access to them in 2023. The article argues, with these new entitlements, the Australian Government is now providing an optimal primary mechanism on workplace domestic violence policy capable of improving social equity outcomes for the majority of Australian workers impacted by domestic violence. Future research can determine whether this proves true.

Non-traditional actor influence

A main finding of the article is the extraordinary influence on workplace domestic violence policy development of anti-domestic violence advocate Ludo McFerran. Her work with trade unions, components of the state and employer parties exemplifies in a novel way the idea of the power of an individual engaged in institutional work to create new institutions (Lawrence et al. 2011). In this case the new institutions (as in newly established laws or practices) are paid domestic violence leave in workplace agreements, awards, and statutes. In developing the policy, McFerran brought these actors to consider the nexus of work and home, confirming previous studies’ findings that such consideration is necessary in order to achieve equality at work (e.g., Baird 2008; Pocock and Charlesworth 2017).

Just as researchers reframed domestic violence as a public issue in the USA (Widiss 2008), so too did Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project and Australian Family and Domestic Violence Clearinghouse researchers reframe it as a workplace issue. These actors’ evidence-based research assisted to legitimise paid domestic violence leave as a primary mechanism for addressing domestic violence, similar to findings of McFerran, Fos-Tuvera and Aeberhard-Hodges (2018). These strategies pressured Australian Governments to enact domestic violence leave in workplace legislation. The article shows that anti-domestic violence advocates were successful in advancing a social equity orientation on the policy with private sector employers, trade unions and the quasi-judiciary. Its findings confirm studies showing the importance of studying non-traditional actor contribution to industrial relations change (e.g., Michelson et al. 2008). The article’s findings of how pivotal these non-traditional actors were on shifting the dial towards a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy make an original contribution to scholarship.

Traditional actor influence

The study finds trade unions influenced workplace domestic violence policy in Australia to a considerable extent. Their work developing domestic violence leave clauses and instigating the collective bargaining of them resulted in the rapid growth of such provisions in the public sector, establishing a critical mass and normalisation of the entitlements. The article’s findings confirm and exemplify Cooper, Ellem and Wright’s (2015) finding that trade unions had more input into policy when centre-left governments were in power. It finds the significant influence of female union members and officials on workplace domestic violence policy developments in Australia. This verifies the importance of women in the trade union movement to workplace equality progress (as shown in e.g., Briskin 2014; Forbes-Mewett and Snell 2006). Employer parties influenced the development of a social equity orientation on workplace domestic violence policy in Australia to less of an extent. This was, as the article finds, employer associations at large were slow to support workplace domestic violence leave as a legitimate workplace entitlement. Its findings confirm previous studies’ findings of employer association prerogative to preference employer interests (e.g., Gooberman et al. 2020).

Components of the state influenced workplace domestic violence policy developments to more of an uneven extent than anti-domestic violence advocates and trade unions. Comparable to findings in the context of the USA (Swanberg et al. 2012), this article finds that lack of private sector employer provision of domestic violence leave in Australia was a factor behind governmental provision of it. In Australia, of components of the state championing paid domestic violence leave as an optimal mechanism for alleviating domestic violence, as in Baird’s (2011, 92) findings on maternity leave policy progress, Australian Law Reform and Human Rights Commissions and women in political parties were to the fore. The Australian Government’s 2022 Bill enacting 10 days of paid domestic violence leave in the NES and stated intention to extend the proposed entitlements to all employees when it ratifies ILO Convention 190 flags the importance of such conventions in furthering a social equity orientation on this policy, as McFerran, Fos-Tuvera and Aeberhard-Hodges (2018) showed in the context of the Philippines. The study’s findings of how exemplary feminist actors collaborated from within and outside of parliaments to progress a social equity orientation on this policy affirms Sawer and Turner’s (2016) theory of the effectiveness of women’s policy machinery in advancing workplace gender equality.

Contribution on Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology

This article’s study of workplace domestic violence policy development builds on Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology. It finds, just as the typology had explanatory power in relation to maternity and parental leave development, so too does it in in relation to workplace domestic violence policy. This is with the exception that on maternity and parental leave policy, a social equity orientation was to 2016 elusive, whereas on workplace domestic violence policy, the article argues, it has been somewhat arrived at. This article expands the type of principal agents identified in the typology to include anti-domestic violence advocates, union members and researchers. It exemplifies and extends in a new setting Baird’s (2004, 2006, 2016) typology as a theory to explain barriers to and progress on workplace gender equality. This is by not only identifying the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of various workplace domestic violence policy orientations in Australia, but by also adding dimensions of causality to it. It does so by explaining the process through which policy actors’ social equity orientations on workplace domestic violence policy were forged (for example, through their lived expertise on and experience of domestic violence) and how from this they were able to influence other policy actors to put in place optimal mechanisms towards securing social equity for employees experiencing domestic violence. In this way the article conceives of the above non-traditional actors as dynamic forces (as identified in Wright and Lansbury, 2019) of change. Future research could employ the article’s analytical framework to investigate workplace domestic violence policy development and implementation in different settings and times.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the reason that workplace domestic violence policy developed in Australia was largely because actors acting on it wanted to achieve social equity outcomes for victims of domestic violence. Ultimately how a social equity orientation on the policy arose was because the force of actors’ actions towards a social equity orientation on it was stronger than resistant actors’ desire to maintain a business orientation. This article contributes new empirical findings concerning workplace domestic violence policy development in Australia, including on how and why non-traditional actors with lived expertise and experience on domestic violence were critical to it. It makes a theoretical contribution by identifying the process through which non-traditional actors (anti-domestic violence advocates, trade union members and researchers) convinced traditional actors to develop mechanisms on domestic violence likely to improve social equity outcomes for domestic violence victims. These findings and ideas are important to scholarship to assist in understanding the interrelationship needed between actor, mechanism, and policy orientation in order to advance equality at work and social equity more broadly.

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the journal’s anonymous reviewers, editors, and Chris F. Wright for their generous and helpful feedback on draft versions of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Susan G. Ellicott

Susan G. Ellicott, B.A. Hons, M.A. (English Literature), Dip.Ed., completed a Master of Philosophy in 2021 in Work and Organisational Studies at The University of Sydney. Her thesis is titled, ‘Development of the Australian Government’s workplace domestic violence policy 2008 to 2018’. Susan has been engaged recently as a guest lecturer on industrial relations policy at the University of Sydney and researcher at the University of Technology, Sydney.

Appendix 1

Table

Appendix 1: Interview participants		Number
State	Commonwealth Ministers – 2 Commonwealth Members of Parliament – 5 State (VIC) Minister – 1 State (NSW) Minister – 1 Commonwealth Sex Discrimination Australian Human Rights Commissioners – 2 Commonwealth parliamentary staff – 1 State (VIC) parliamentary staff – 1 Commonwealth project managers & officers – 2	15
Union	ACTU president – 1 ACTU officials – 2 State (NSW) union peak body presidents – 1 State (NSW) peak body officers – 1 State (VIC) union peak body officers – 3 National union leaders – 3 State union (VIC & NSW) leaders – 2 State union official (VIC) – 1 State union official (NSW) – 3	17
Employer Association	Australian Industry Group Official National Retail Association Executive Victorian Hospitals’ Industrial Association Executive	3
Employers	Spokespersons from PwC, KPMG, Telstra, NAB, CBA and VIC regional council	6
Other	Key informant working in various roles including anti-domestic violence advocacy, Commonwealth & Australian state project management & academia – 1 (interviewed twice) International Labour Organization official – 1 National domestic violence peak body organisation CEO – 1	3
Total	While the number of participants was 43, one Commonwealth M.P. interviewed was formerly ACTU President, accounting for the total of 44 informants of various capacities.	44
Key to participants cited in-text: role/s in relation to workplace DV policy development P.1: Ludo McFerran: Anti-domestic violence advocate; Co-Manager, Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project P.2: Diversity & Inclusion Executive, Finance Sector P.5: President ACTU; MP (Cth, Labor) P.7: Co-Manager, Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project P.8: Union Branch Secretary P.10: Bureau Director, International Labour Organization P.11: Officer, VIC Trades Hall Council P.12 Union Branch Secretary P.14 Former Safe at Home, Safe at Work Project Officer; Former Union Officer P.15: Senior Officer, VIC Trades Hall Council P.16: Legal Officer ACTU P.17: Australian Sex Discrimination Commissioner P.20: MP (Cth) Labor P.23: MP (Cth) Labor; Chair, Federal Labor Party Status of Women’s Committee P.25: Executive – National Retail Association P.26: Human Resources Manager, VIC Local Government Council P.27: Program Director, Male Champions of Change (now Champions of Change) P.28: M.P. (Cth.) Labor; Cabinet Minister P.29: Academic/Former Legal Officer, Safe At Home, Safe at Work Project P.35: MP (Cth) Labor; Cabinet Minister P.41: Executive Officer, Rape & Domestic Violence Services Australia P.42: Union Industrial & Women’s Officer P.43: Executive – Victorian Hospitals Industry Association Key: MP = Member of Parliament