Employers’ responses to Australia’s Right to Disconnect law, which went into effect in August 2024, ranged from alarm to outright panic. Attorneys sent memos. HR departments were in a panic. Business associations issued a warning about operational chaos. After that, not much happened for the better part of a year. No historic decisions. No flood of grievances. As of late August 2025, the Fair Work Commission acknowledged that it had not yet thoroughly examined a single case under the new provisions. Really quiet.
Maybe that silence is over now.
A Queensland teacher has filed a claim in the Federal Court for nearly $780,000, claiming that her employer violated her right to disconnect by sending serious misconduct allegations during her school holiday leave, which she believed to be off-duty time. She was fired after her request for an extension was turned down and she failed to reply within the allotted time. An already complex claim is further complicated by the fact that she claims she was singled out after voicing concerns about internal staff review procedures and child safety. There’s a lot to sort out.
Although it is difficult to overlook $730,000 in lost future earnings and $50,000 in emotional distress damages, there are other factors that make this case worthwhile to watch. The case specifically asks a court to determine whether the right to disconnect is applicable in situations where formal disciplinary actions are involved in the communication. It seems natural to think of holiday leave as protected time. However, a regular work email is not the same as a misconduct notice. It turns out that the distinction between them is not as obvious as the law may have thought.
This is already being referred to by legal experts as a test of the boundaries of the law. As employment attorney Amy Zhang has noted, the main point of contention is whether the obligation to reply was appropriately classified as occurring outside of working hours in the first place. Although it may seem like a technicality, that is the crux of the issue. There will be immediate and substantial ramifications for employers handling serious HR situations if the court decides that even disciplinary communications may be denied while on leave.
Confusion on this issue is still prevalent, so it’s important to keep in mind what the law actually says. Managers are still able to contact employees after hours despite their right to disconnect. Employees are free to decline to keep an eye on, read, or reply to that contact, unless doing so is thought to be unreasonable. The reasonableness test takes into consideration things like the employee’s personal circumstances, the nature of the communication, urgency, and whether they are paid for their availability. That adaptability was most likely deliberate. Uncertainty was also inevitable.
Australia is not the only country addressing this. Similar safeguards have been in place in France since 2016. Companies are prohibited from contacting workers outside of their rest periods in Portugal, and there are penalties for doing so. In 2021, digital disconnection rights were enshrined in Spain. In each instance, the laws appeared sophisticated on paper but were difficult to implement. Australia appears to be adhering to this pattern.
The timing puts additional strain on small businesses. Businesses with fewer than 15 employees are now covered by the laws as of August 2025; this group frequently lacks dedicated HR resources or retainer legal counsel. Depending on your point of view, the Queensland teacher’s case coincides with the start of that expansion, which is either regrettable or instructive.
Whether this one case will lead to a wave of similar claims or continue to be an anomaly defined by its specific facts is still up in the air. It appears that the prediction made a year ago that the right to disconnect would primarily appear within general protections claims rather than stand alone is coming to pass. That’s not a legal failure. It’s more indicative of the tendency for employment rights to gain traction through accumulated cases before they begin to significantly alter behavior.
The Queensland case is still pending. However, it has already accomplished something beneficial: it has given the question a concrete form. Not “does Australia have a right to disconnect”—that question has been resolved—but rather what that right genuinely safeguards in dire circumstances.
