Re-imagining decent work for home care workers in Australia

ABSTRACT

The progress in Australia towards the full industrial recognition of home care work as ‘work’ has stalled. This paper draws on International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers 2011 to argue for a re-imaging of decent minimum standards for home care workers in Australia. While to date Australia has not ratified ILO 189, home care workers, who are employed to work in the homes of the aged or with people with disabilities, fall within the scope of this Convention. Drawing on the scholarship and activism that has emerged around ILO 189 we argue that with the slow but steady shift to more fragmented, individualised and informal employment relationships in home care services re-imagining employment protections for home care workers in Australia is crucial. Recasting minimum labour standards for work described as both ‘work like all other’ and ‘work like no other work’ could well provide a basis for a more substantial re-imagining of Australian employment regulation for all workers.

KEYWORDS:

• Decent work
• home care
• minimum labour standards
• ILO Domestic Workers Convention

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. This paper draws on a broader cross-national project examining regulatory strategies to improve the quality of jobs held by frontline care workers (ARC FT120100346 Prospects for quality work and gender equality in frontline care work).

2. In this paper we use the generic term ‘home care worker’ to include all those workers who provide long-term care to both aged care and clients with a disability in private homes. However, we note that currently under the SCHCDS Award these two groups of workers are separately and respectively classified as ‘home care employee’ and as ‘social and community services employee’.

3. Australian Business Industrial & the NSW Business Chamber, Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award. Casual Employment and Part-Time Employment, Fair Work Commission: 4 Yearly Review of Modern Awards, 30 November 2015 https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/sites/awardsmodernfouryr/common/am2014196-197-sub-abi-301115.pdf.

4. Draft Consent Determination, 4 Yearly Review of Modern Awards [AM2014/285], Social, Community, home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010. Fair Work Commission, Australia.

5. Decent work is defined as ‘opportunities for work that is productive and delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for families, better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.’ (ILO, http://www.ilo.org/global/topics/decent-work/lang–en/index.htm).

6. See https://www.fwc.gov.au/documents/sites/awardsmodernfouryr/am20152-sub-witness-statements-actu-090517.pdf.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Australian Research Council [FT120100346].

Notes on contributors

Sara Charlesworth

Sara Charlesworth is Professor of Gender Work & Regulation in the School of Management at RMIT University. Her current research is on frontline care work focusing on the conditions of decent work and good care and the intersections of care, employment and migration regimes.

Jenny Malone

Jenny Malone is a researcher at RMIT University in the Centre for People Organisation & Work (CPOW). Jenny's current research explores the dimensions of care work including the ways in which gender, migration and the organisation and regulation of care work intersect to shape working conditions.