ARTICLE · 28 JULY 2013

The Fair Work Act gets more family-friendly

Marque Lawyers

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'Family-friendly measures' and flexible working arrangements were introduced as recent amendments to the Fair Work Act.

AustraliaEmployment and HR

Amber Sharp (Formerly With Marque Lawyers)

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Acknowledging that some of us actually have families that occasionally need our attention, new 'family-friendly measures' were introduced as part of the recent amendments to the Fair Work Act.

The new measures, which commenced on 1 July 2013, include:

an expansion of the class of employees who can request flexible work arrangements to include those aged over 55 years, those with children of school age (previously pre-school age), people with disabilities, and those affected by domestic violence;
an express right for parents returning from leave in relation to the birth or adoption of a child to request part-time employment; and
increasing the amount of concurrent parental leave from three weeks to eight weeks, which can be taken in separate periods no shorter than two weeks.

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