Coalition axes working from home, forced redundancies policies in attempt to reboot Peter Dutton’s campaign

A senior Coalition source says the jettisoning of his working from home policy for public servants was part of ‘cleaning up’ the negativities of Peter Dutton’s campaign amid flagging polls and Labor attacks.

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Peter Dutton will dump his demands that public servants return to the office and will not hand out any forced redundancies to taxpayer-funded workers, in a backflip designed to reboot the Opposition Leader’s campaign and win back female voters.

The Coalition will on Monday unveil a five-year plan to reduce the bureaucracy by 41,000 people through hiring freezes and not ­always replacing workers who ­retire or resign.

After months of confusion over how the Coalition would slash public servant numbers, and the weaponisation of the Opposition Leader’s criticism of bureaucrats working from home, The Australian understands the jettisoning of a return-to-the-­office policy was part of “cleaning up” the negativities of Mr Dutton’s campaign.

Only last month he said he did not believe that “61 per cent of the public servants who are working in Canberra should be working from home”.

“I think they should return to work, back to pre-Covid levels which was just over 20 per cent of people who work from home, so we could help people get that balance in their lives, but also deliver efficiency in the way in which they are expending the money that’s given them by Australian taxpayers,” he said at the time.

But with Mr Dutton losing his months-long polling edge against Anthony Albanese amid growing Liberal concerns over his campaign strategy, The Australian understands Liberal candidates in key seats were reporting significant hostility towards the return-to-the-office policy from voters, and particularly among women.

A senior Coalition source confirmed there had been a realisation at the top levels there was a lack of “sharpness” about what the Liberals and Nationals’ proposition was.

As the Coalition aimed on Sunday to narrow the electorate’s focus on its plan to reduce migration and end the housing crisis, one Liberal source said the turn-a-round on the public service policy was “a pragmatic U-turn”.

Jane Hume. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

In a stark departure from the Coalition’s policy just a month ago when its public service spokesman, Jane Hume, said “all members of the APS work from the office five days a week”, there is now no expectation on the number of days in the office.

Senator Hume on Monday will reverse course and will ensure there is no mandated minimum number of days for public servants to work in the office. “Many professional men and women in the commonwealth public service are benefiting from flexible working arrangements, including working from home, which allow them to make valuable contributions to serving Australians,” she said in a statement. “We have listened, and understand that flexible work, including working from home, is part of getting the best out of any workforce.”

Senator Hume had previously said that remote work arrangements had become unsustainable and unproductive.

Anthony Albanese. Picture: Jason Edwards / NewsWire

Labor has for weeks been weaponsing the Coalition’s return to the office edict and public service reductions, and tried to connect Mr Dutton’s proposals to the push from US President Donald Trump and his billionaire offsider Elon Musk to slash the Washington bureaucracy.

Just as the Coalition was planning to unveil its backflip on working from home, the Prime Minister on Sunday used a landmark campaign speech to ramp up his claim Mr Dutton wants to end working from home across the economy and make Australia more like America.

“My opponent started his campaign measuring up the ­curtains at Kirribilli House while telling everyone else they can’t work from home,” Mr Albanese said in the Greens-held inner Brisbane seat of Griffith.

“He denigrates people working from home – we’re building more homes. That’s the choice.

“That’s the way forward for us. Our own way. The future we want is not an American-style wages system. Not American levels of student debt. And never, ever American healthcare.”

Elon Musk speaks as US President Donald Trump looks on in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on February 11, 2025. (Photo by Jim WATSON / AFP)

The Coalition’s new position on limiting public service growth more closely follows the plan opposition government efficiency spokeswoman Jacinta Price laid out to The Australian earlier this year, before she was forced to clarify to say there would be “reductions” in current numbers.

Mr Dutton’s dumped policy of getting public servants back into the office did not extend to the private sector, and business groups such as the Business Council of Australia has had a policy of leaving individual firms to make their own policies.

ACTU president Michele O’Neil has previously condemned the Coalition policy. “Forcing hundreds of thousands of workers back on the roads will mean less time with kids and more time in traffic,” she said.

Australian Industry Group chief executive Innes Willox has supported a shift back to the workplace for public servants.

“If you want to work out why public sector productivity sees zero growth, the obvious place to look is at the right to work from home first rule that the government has in place,” he said.

Part of the problem and cost for government for allowing work from home is the security risk and insurance, including cyber security.

The Productivity Commission says many jobs can now be effectively done from home, and that the number of people working from home would likely “remain much higher than it was previously”.

The commission said Australia’s work health and safety laws were flexible enough and well-placed to manage an increase in home-based work.