New positive duty requirements for ECEC employers following Respect at Work Bill

Following the late September introduction of the Anti-Discrimination and Human Rights Legislation Amendment (Respect at Work) Bill 2022 into Parliament employers of all types, including those in the early childhood education and care (ECEC) space have new obligations to their employees. 

The piece below seeks to outline some of the core implications. For a more detailed overview of requirements, please refer to the Bill itself, or this summary. 

The Bill sought to amend the Sex Discrimination Act 1984 (Cth) to introduce a positive duty on all employers to ‘take reasonable and proportionate measures to eliminate, as far as possible, specified forms of unlawful sex discrimination including: 

• discrimination on the ground of a person’s sex 
• sexual harassment, or harassment on the ground of sex 
• hostile workplace environments 
• acts of victimisation in response to allegations, assertions, complaints, or proceedings. 

“Given these changes and the new positive duty on employers to eliminate unlawful sex discrimination, it is critical that employers consider what is being done within their service to address and eliminate unlawful sex discrimination,” a representative from the Early Learning Association Australia (ELAA) explained.  

The new ‘positive duty’ will require employers to: 

• have clear policies in place, which make it clear that sex discrimination (including sexual harassment) is against the law and that employees may face disciplinary action, up to and including the termination of their employment, for breaches of such policies. 
• ensure that employees are aware of the policies and receive appropriate training, and
• ensure that any complaints about unlawful sex discrimination are dealt with appropriately. 

For more advice about understanding discrimination in the workplace please see here.