is homework illegal in australia

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Legal Homework Rights: What’s the Limit on Homework?

Hi, I just read your article Titled “Can You ‘Opt Out’ of Homework?” ( Click HERE  for the original article. ) I enjoyed the article but I guess I need a more concrete answer to the question of my legal homework rights: CAN I LEGALLY OPT OUT OF HOMEWORK FOR MY CHILD? – Dawn, SOAR ®  Parent

The answer is a resounding, Yes!

You have legal rights to put limits on your child’s homework time.

When homework begins to erode family relationships and/or increases the students anxiety, its time to make modifications. First, try communicating and working collaboratively with teachers and administrators.  If that doesn’t work, then you do have legal homework rights…

Legal Homework Rights

You absolutely do have legal rights to put reasonable limits on your child’s homework time. The legal tool you want to use is called a 504. For a link that provides a quick overview to the 504 law, click HERE .

504: The Legal Homework Rights Tool

Basically, the 504 law refers to legal homework rights (known as “accommodations”) that must be made for a child’s “impairment.”  As you’ll read, “impairments” are defined very loosely throughout the law, and this is done purposely to accommodate all students’ various needs. If your child has a diagnosis of ADHD, Dyslexia, etc. that will help, but it’s not necessary.

I have seen the 504 law used throughout my career as an educator for students and families exercising their legal homework rights.  I have also used it with my own children to get schools to accommodate what I felt was appropriate.

The 504 Process

The actual 504 process includes paperwork and a series of meetings. The meetings typically include a school counselor, a teacher, an administrator, and you and your child. In the meeting, all of your concerns will be documented and specific actions or remedies (like limiting homework) will be recorded. This document becomes a legally binding contract that your child’s teacher and administrator are required to uphold.

Legal Homework Rights: What’s a Reasonable Amount of Time for Homework?

So, what is a reasonable recommendation regarding time spent on homework?

We support the “10 Minute Rule.”   That’s a maximum of 10 minutes times the grade-level of the child. So, 10-minute max for 1 st grade, 20-minute max for 2 nd grade, up to 120-minute max for 12 th grade.

The “10-minute rule” is a great accommodation for a 504, because it is set to increase the limit on homework time as the child progresses through school. We’re not talking about eliminating homework just to create an easy path for our children.  Parents that have significant battles over homework, that can easily last an hour or more, understand that homework reaches a point where it is not productive.

Too much homework is destructive t o motivation, self-esteem, and to family relationships.  So, don’t be afraid to exercise your legal rights. This is the point where we want to pursue our legal homework rights.

In addition to pursuing 504 accommodations, you may want to give your students better skills to handle the demands of school.  To learn more about the SOAR ®  Parent Products, click HERE .

Brian Winter, M.Ed.

Co-Author, SOAR Social-Emotional Learning Skills

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School operations

The purpose of this policy is to ensure all schools work with their school communities to develop and communicate a considered homework policy.

• Victorian government schools are required to have a homework policy and communicate it to staff, parents/carers and students.
• The content of this policy is not prescribed, but should be evidence-informed and comprehensive, and must be developed in consultation with the school community.
• School council approval of a school’s homework policy is not required.
• A homework policy template is available on the School Policy Templates Portal External Link (staff login required); schools are encouraged to adapt this template to suit their needs.

Victorian government schools are required to have a homework policy.

The content of this policy is not prescribed by the Department, but should be evidence-informed and comprehensive, outlining:

• a rationale for the elements of the school’s policy
• the responsibilities and expectations of teachers, students and parents/carers in setting, completing, monitoring and responding to homework

The school’s homework policy must be developed in consultation with the school council, as representatives of the school community, and school staff and students. School council approval of a school’s homework policy is not required.

Victorian government schools must periodically communicate their homework policy to staff, parents, carers and students through available communication channels (such as the school newsletter, or by placing the policy on the school’s website).

The setting of homework can be seen as one way of:

• complementing and reinforcing classroom learning
• fostering good lifelong learning and study habits
• developing self-regulation processes such as goal-setting, self-efficacy, self-reflection and time management
• supporting partnerships with parents/carers by connecting families with the learning of their children

The effectiveness of homework can be enhanced when:

• it is set at an appropriate level for each student, supporting those who are experiencing difficulty and extending those of high-ability
• it is related to essential learning at school
• choice in tasks is provided
• it is assessed by teachers, either formally or informally, with feedback provided
• it supports students to have a balance of school-related and non-school related activity in their lives (i.e. where the amount of homework set provides sufficient additional time for students to engage with family, sport and recreation, cultural pursuits and employment, where appropriate)

Definitions

Homework Tasks assigned to students by school teachers that are meant to be carried out during non-school hours.

Reviewed 11 January 2024

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Policy last updated

15 June 2020

Teacher Professional Practice Unit

Education News

The pros and cons of homework.

John Hattie is Professor of Education and Director of the Melbourne Education Research Institute at the University of Melbourne, Australia, and the author of Visible Learning , a synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement in education.

When deciding on how much, and what, homework to hand out, Hattie says there are quite a few things teachers should consider.

“Homework in primary school has a measurable effect of around zero,” Hattie told BBC Radio 4 Journalist Sarah Montague.

“In high school it does have a larger measurable effect, which is why we need to get it right, not why we need to get rid of it. It’s one of those lower hanging fruit that we should be looking at in our primary schools to say ‘Is it really making a difference?”’

Hattie looked at research studies from all over the world that have tried to measure the impact of various factors on education, including the optimal time students should be spending on homework.

He found homework appears to be more effective for higher-ability rather than lower-ability students, and for older rather than younger students.

CensusAtSchool is a collaborative project involving teachers, the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Ministry of Education, which examines the lives of children in year four to 12.

A comparison of the findings from 2008 to 2013, reveals that Australian children are spending more time doing homework than they were five years ago.

In 2008, Australian children spent an average of 5.3 hours a week doing their homework. Today that has jumped to seven hours a week. Child psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg said he was concerned by the trend that kids were spending an increasing amount of time on homework, and believes the trend is linked to higher levels of anxiety.

“I actually think less is more with homework, because there seems to be so much stress around school,” he said.

A number of primary schools in Australia are effectively handing the decision-making power over to parents, allowing parents to permanently excuse children from homework.

Some primary schools have even sent letters home to parents outlining their reasoning for setting homework, but ultimately recognising that parents are best placed to make decisions about whether or not their children have the capacity or time to complete it.

Hattie is more positive about giving secondary school aged children homework.

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) found that high-school aged Australian students are also spending more hours doing homework each week.

The report found that 15-year-old Australian students spend an average of six hours a week doing homework. That marks an increase of 0.3 hours per week from the 2003 study.

Australia and Austria were the only countries to report a statistically significant increase in the amount of time students spend doing homework.

“The overall effect of homework on achievement in older students is positive, but there are quite a few qualifications to that,” Hattie writes in Visible Learning . Qualifications included things like the age of the learner, the amount of homework, and whether the homework was task-oriented or complex and unstructured.

Neurologist and former classroom teacher Judy Willis says if a teacher knows a bit about the brain, he or she can plan homework to suit the needs of students as they develop.

“During early school years, for example, the brain is focused on getting to grips with the world around us. Memories and understanding grow when new information can be linked to things we already know. Homework that helps with this recognition can build literacy and numeracy skills,” says Willis.

“When students reach adolescence, they become more independent and self-directed. There is shift away from rote memorisation and single, correct responses. Learning goals are more likely to focus on reading for content and comprehension, revising, report writing, solving problems, investigating and independent or group work.”

Willis says that while the amount of time spent on homework will always vary depending on the age of students, there are a few physiological guidelines to remember.

“After about 15 minutes of learning and practising something – such as the Pythagorean theorem in maths – the regions of the brain activated in spatial-numerical learning get fatigued and need to rebuild the neurotransmitters, such as dopamine, that get depleted,” says Willis. “The restoration only takes a few minutes if the break is timely, but if they are pushed to stay with that same process for too long, stress builds, neurotransmitters drop way down and it will take twice as long to restore full efficiency to that area of the brain.”

Willis recommends online games for learning basic knowledge as they usually have set timings.

“You can assign a specific amount of time to be spent on the skill-building program for homework and confirm students’ compliance by checking the teachers’ pages,” she says.

“When students know that the effort they put into homework will enhance their participation and enjoyment of classroom learning, they become more motivated. Pupils also put more effort into schoolwork or homework when they are engaged in something that is relevant to their studies.”

One of the studies Hattie examined warned against homework that undermined a student’s motivation, as it could lead to the student internalising incorrect routines.

“For too many students, homework reinforces that they cannot learn by themselves and that they cannot do the schoolwork,” says Hattie. “Ensuring that students are assessment-capable learners is the most important thing we can do to raise student achievement.”

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Discipline and school rules

For free and confidential legal advice about this topic, please contact us here ., schools can made school rules about a range of things e.g. uniform, attendance, bringing devices to school, or bullying. the exact rules that will apply to your situation will depend on whether you go to a privacy school or a public school., if you are ever unsure what your school’s rules are, you can check the school website, student diary, enrolment pack or ask the student office for a copy of the school rules., navigate this page, public schools.

Whilst public schools are allowed to make their own rules, they must also follow any relevant policies from the Department of Education e.g. the Department might require schools to have an anti-bullying policy. The Department might also describe what must be contained in these rules e.g. how students should be disciplined for breaking the rules.

Private schools

The  rules at private schools may be a little different. Private schools can make their own rules and when a student enrols at a private school, their parents/guardians will sign an enrolment agreement where they agree that their child will follow school rules. Failure to follow these rules may result in schools reasonably punishing the student.

When do school rules apply?

Generally schools cannot control what students do outside school hours and outside school grounds. But a school can make rules about what students do while they are in or near school grounds during school hours and immediately before and after school, or when interacting with people from school e.g. your school can have a cyber bullying policy that applies to bullying that happens outside of school.

Changing school rules

Your school is allowed to make changes to their rules and normally changes to school rules should be announced at school assemblies, in class or in school circulars/newsletters after appropriate discussion with the wider school community.

If you think a rule is unfair, you can influence school rules by talking to other people to see if they think a particular rule is unfair and should be changed, and then getting a student representative to take up the matter with the school council, the Parents and Citizens’ Association or the school principal.

What happens if I break a school rule?

Each school is responsible for making their own rules and to set reasonable punishments for breaking these rules.  For example, if you break a school rule, a teacher can give you detention during lunchtime, free periods or any break during the school day. Detention should not last so long that you don’t have time to eat your lunch or have a break from lessons.

Schools can punish you for a range of things that break school rules, such as misconduct, not completing homework, disobeying instructions, being disruptive in class, not wearing your uniform correctly and so on.  Your school can give you a range of punishments, including detentions and school service. Your school may also choose to suspend or exclude you, please see our Suspensions  or Expulsions pages for more detail.

Your punishment should not be unfair or unreasonable. You should not be punished by being made to stand in one position for more than a short period, or by having to do an unpleasant job such as cleaning out the toilets. But the school can punish you by making you clean up the classroom, or collect rubbish. You have a right to be treated fairly by your school and not be harassed or discriminated against.

The rules will vary slightly depending on if you go to a private school or a public school for what kinds of punishments you can receive. If you feel you have been treated unfairly by a school rule, it is important that you get a copy of your school rules and any relevant other policy documents e.g. Department of Education policies for public schools, Catholic Education policies for Catholic schools.

What can I do if a school rule is unfair, or I have been treated unfairly?

If you feel you have been treated unfairly, you may have a right to appeal a particular decision. You should ask your parent or guardian to arrange a meeting with the school to find out the reasons why the school rule exists, or for them to explain why you were disciplined in a certain way. If you are still not happy after this meeting, you can consider making a further complaint to the Department of Education (for public schools) or the school’s board or governance body (for private schools).

Find information about school rules in other states

• New South Wales
• South Australia
• Western Australia

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Date published, last updated.

• Education (General Provisions) Act 2007 (QLD)

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• Just For Fun

Homework banned in Australia from April 1, you’ve got to be joking!

A nationwide ban on homework for Aussie kids is news worth celebrating … or is it?

Is Bluey really moving home?

Aussie blueberry sets world record

READING LEVEL: GREEN

Leave your books at school, put down your pens and pencils at 3.30pm! A new law has banned homework for Australian students.

The new rule comes into effect on April 1, 2022.

Hang on, is there something familiar about that date?

Gotcha! Yes, it’s April Fools’ Day.

This is just one of the many pranks that will be played in classrooms, school yards, homes, businesses, on websites and in the media this April Fools’ Day.

So where did this wacky tradition begin?

It’s all a bit of a mystery actually. The most likely origin* seems to trace back to Rome, Italy, in 1582 when Pope Gregory XIII decided it would be a good idea to adopt the new Gregorian calendar* (named after himself).

The year had previously started at the end of March under an old Roman calendar, but under the new Gregorian calendar rules it was moved to January 1.

Even though the news was spread, some people clearly didn’t get the message in time and continued to celebrate the New Year on April 1. Because of this, they were laughed at and branded as “fools”; and that is where the tradition of April Fools’ Day is believed to have started.

Another theory places the origin of April Fools’ Day in France in 1564, when king Charles IX decreed that the new year would no longer begin at Easter, which often falls in April depending on the lunar cycle, and would instead start on January 1. Those who clung to the old ways were called “April Fools.”

Historians have also linked April Fools’ Day to festivals such as Hilaria, which was celebrated in ancient Rome at the end of March and involved people dressing up in disguises.

Others think April Fools’ Day was tied to the vernal equinox, or first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, when Mother Nature fooled people with changing, unpredictable* weather.

More recently, people have gone to great lengths to create amazing April Fools’ Day hoaxes.

Newspapers, radio and TV stations and websites have also participated in the April 1 tradition by reporting outrageous fictional* stories that have fooled their audiences.

In Australia, Canada and England, April Fools’ Day jokes are only supposed to be played until noon.

It is believed prank victims are only “fools” if they fall for a trick early in the day. After that, the fools become those who try to carry out pranks after noon.

Many people are divided on this issue, however, and some insist on carrying out pranks all day.

• origin: where something began
• Gregorian calendar: the calendar we continue to used today, based on a seasonal year of about 365 days, which is the time it takes for Earth to revolve once around the sun
• unpredictable: hard to predict or know what will happen, likely to change suddenly
• fictional: imaginary, not true

EXTRA READING

Matt Stanton’s guide to pranking

Why do we pull pranks on April Fools’ Day?

• What prank does this story attempt to pull on the reader?
• Which Pope is thought to be linked to the origin of April Fools’ Day
• What year did this Pope introduce a new calendar?
• Which French king is also linked to a theory about the origin of April Fools’ Day?
• What part of the day are pranks supposed to be played in some countries including Australia?

LISTEN TO THIS STORY

CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES 1. Make the rules Sometimes our idea of a funny prank or joke can actually be hurtful or insulting. Write a list of at least five April Fools’ Day rules. The purpose of your list is to help people come up with fun things to do that are not hurtful or insulting.

Time: allow 20 minutes to complete this activity Curriculum Links: English, Personal and Social Capability

2. Extension Create another fun day that can be celebrated! Give your day a name, write a description of what your day is about and how it must be celebrated. Include the date and write a short explanation of why you have chosen that date. You can include activities, special foods or anything else that makes your day fun and special.

Time: allow 30 minutes to complete this activity Curriculum Links: English

VCOP ACTIVITY Punctuation thief Pick a paragraph from the article, or about three sentences together if that’s easier, and rewrite it without the punctuation.

At the bottom of the page write a list of all the punctuation you stole and in the order you stole it. For example; C , . A .

Then swap your book with another person and see if they can work out where the punctuation needs to go back in.

Make it easier: Underline where you stole the punctuation from but don’t put the list at the bottom in order.

Make it harder: Don’t put the punctuation in order at the bottom. Underline where you took the punctuation from, but don’t tell them what pieces you took. Just tell them how many pieces you took, but not what they are. Don’t give them any clues!

Moving home is something lots of kids have to go through, but could Australia’s favourite animated family really be selling their iconic Brisbane house? And if so, where would they move to?

A northern NSW farm has claimed a Guinness World Record for producing the world’s heaviest blueberry – check out the pictures and find out how this massive superfood came to tip the scales

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Is Homework Legal or Required in America, Australia or UK

Is Homework Legal or Illegal

Homework is a set of school assignments that teachers give students to complete them at home. Essentially, it is any type of task that students are given to complete outside their classroom. School homework may require a student to write projects, review test, read or tackle mathematical quizzes.

The purpose of homework has been attracting controversial debates for many years. While it is ideal for improving academic performance of adult students, the same cannot be said about young children.

Homework can be a source of stress for both students and parents because it limits the amount of time spent on other activities. Even though it can improve the academic skills of students who are slow, its benefits are still contentious.

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Is Homework Illegal?  

The significance of homework in schools cannot be overlooked. Despite the numerous criticisms, homework is still an integral part of learning. The only negative impact of homework is the fact that it denies students time to participate in other activities while outside school.

In most if not all jurisdictions, homework is legal. In the United States of America, homework has been receiving a lot of resistance from parents and students.

As a result, there are schools that have given parents the chance to opt out as long as they feel the homework is no longer benefiting their child.

Connecticut, New Jersey, Utah, Florida and Louisiana are some of the states that allow schools to set their own homework rules.

Presently, there are no laws from the government banning homework in schools. States and districts have been given the opportunity to come up with homework laws after discussing with parents.

For this reasons, many schools have made the decision not to include homework at the elementary level. At this level, excluding homework will enable the students sleep better and have more time for leisure events.

Is Homework Necessary?

With the numerous debates about the usefulness of homework, it is still a necessary part of schooling. There are subjects that need frequent practice whether students are at home or in school. Mathematics is one example of subject that needs homework for thorough practice.

The principals of mathematics can be easily mastered when there is constant practice. In the absence of homework, such subjects will become difficult and some students will be disadvantaged.   Therefore, homework is necessary for some subjects but not all of them.

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Is Homework Slavery?

Students are given homework without their consent or permission. However, this does not make it an act of slavery. The tutors or teachers who give homework assignments do not enjoy any economic benefits.

The main aim of homework for students is to help them practice the different concepts that were taught in class.

It is a simple act of practice that enables learners not to forget the knowledge they get from class.

To have more time attend other activities, there are homework cheat websites that have competent and quick academic assistance.

Is Homework Good or Bad?

Holiday homework has advantages and disadvantages. On the positive side, homework helps to bridge the gap between a student’s leisure time and the academic works.

When students are on holidays, homework assignments will make it easier for them to integrate into the school work once they return. 

Homework simply makes them to be in touch with the school class work even when they stay home for long.

The act of practicing all the subjects they learned in school will make their minds not to forget.

On the other hand, homework can be disadvantageous because it takes the relaxation and family time of the student. As usual, all students need time away from books. This is the ideal time to connect with family members and take part in other leisure activities.

Having homework is a clear indication that a part of this time will be used for studying.

People Also Read: Hardest Essay Topics For High School and University Students

How To Help Students Cope With Homework

Students can find it difficult to balance between homework and leisure activities. Following this, there are a couple of approaches a parent can undertake to make sure homework is not a burden to the child. The following measures will help a child struggling with homework:

1. A Study Routine

Fixing a specific timeline for homework is important. In most cases, parents do not have adequate time for reviewing homework. Reviewing of homework is important so as to provide the necessary assistance and have other meaningful discussion.

With the presence of social media, games and television, only a proper study routine can make work easier. The best time for homework can be after dinner or early morning so that there is adequate time to relax or sleep afterwards.

2.  Allocate Homework Space

Just like other studies, homework needs a place where there are no distractions. For instance, it is easier for a student to fall asleep when doing homework if the environment is too comfortable.

Therefore, setting up a designated space devoid of distractions will create a good environment for homework.

3. The use of Incentives

If a child perceives homework as a punishment, it will be difficult to create time for the assignment. A better way of keeping them close to the schoolwork is by having a motivational structure such as incentives.

This is a form of rewarding a student for completing homework in time. Unlocking of Wi-Fi or promising a holiday are some ideal ways of rewarding a child.

When not handling complex essays and academic writing tasks, Josh is busy advising students on how to pass assignments. In spare time, he loves playing football or walking with his dog around the park.

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Should Australia have a law against cyberbullying? Problematising the murky legal environment of cyberbullying from perspectives within schools

• Published: 28 May 2021
• Volume 49 , pages 827–844, ( 2022 )

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• Donna Pennell   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9446-8856 1 ,
• Marilyn Campbell   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4477-2366 1 ,
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Cyberbullying is a harmful practice to which schools must respond. Australia does not have a cyberbullying-specific law, so schools navigate their responses within a range of laws not created for the online world, nor for youth. In this study, the murky legal environment of youth cyberbullying was problematised from perspectives found within two Australian secondary school communities. School leaders, key staff, teachers, students, and parents participated in interviews or focus groups held to gather their views about whether a new cyberbullying-specific law was needed to help reduce youth cyberbullying. A thematic analysis found three themes: that an educational approach was favoured over a legal one; that current laws mediated a constrained discussion about the benefit a new cyberbullying-specific law would have for schools and that there were school-identified unmet spaces where the law should be contributing better solutions to youth cyberbullying. Legal responses with implications for reducing youth cyberbullying are discussed.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by an Australian Research Council Grant No. LP 110200330. Donna Pennell is a recipient of an Australian Government Research Training Program Stipend.

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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by Donna Pennell, Marilyn Campbell, and Donna Tangen, with legal contributions and review by Andrew Knott. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Donna Pennell and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Pennell, D., Campbell, M., Tangen, D. et al. Should Australia have a law against cyberbullying? Problematising the murky legal environment of cyberbullying from perspectives within schools. Aust. Educ. Res. 49 , 827–844 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13384-021-00452-w

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Is Homework Illegal in Australia?

The first answer is a resounding “yes.” If a student is absent from class for more than two days in a row, and if that same student does not attend his/her classes during the rest of the week, then that student is not receiving a proper education. This, in itself, may cause many problems in a student’s ability to succeed later on in life and may cause the lower grades to rise even after the child has been home.

The second answer is not so cut and dried. There are actually a few legal gray areas surrounding homework that parents should be aware of. The first is that in most instances, a parent may have to foot the bill for the class. This means that if you are unable to come to the class, then you will likely have to cover the cost of your child’s home schooling with your own funds.

The second legal gray area surrounding homework is that in some states, home schooling is not a legal right. In these states, parents can simply homeschool their children without having to register them as “homework students” with the Department of Education or make other requirements. This is a gray area and depends on each state’s laws. So a parent would need to check with each state in relation to whether homeschooling is a right in the eyes of the law. While most states consider homeschooling a private matter, it is usually more complicated than that, especially in the home schooling realm.

If your child is in public school, then the answer to the question is homework illegal in Australia may be easier to come up with. In most cases, public schools do not require that children do any school work outside of school hours. If a parent wants their child to do homework, they generally do not have to do it at home or on their own time. Many students like to do their schoolwork on the weekends so this may not be an issue for them. If a parent does find that their child is required to do some form of homework outside of regular school hours, then they can file a paperwork request with the school.

Private schools are generally not allowed to ask a student to do any schoolwork outside of school hours. This is because doing homework is considered unsubsidized work, and is therefore not a part of the student’s financial aid package. Students can usually only do a certain amount of work in school each semester. Some parents still try to get their children to do work there during the summer months when they are there for many different programs, but it is generally considered unnecessary.

It is possible that you are wondering is homework illegal in Australia if you have to pay for a private school to do your work. In most cases, yes, it is illegal to reimburse a school for costs that they incur for your children to do schoolwork. Most states have become very strict about this matter and have laws that prevent parents from helping their child with illegal activities. You will have to contact your local school district to see what the policy is in your area.

The last question that you have to ask yourself is, “Is homework illegal in Australia?” If you suspect that your child is being asked or required to do homework by another student, then you need to let your child know that it is not okay and to keep it out of the homework folder. If they refuse to cooperate, then you need to find alternative ways to get your child to complete assignments. Your child may be very tempted to do extra assignments or may simply refuse to do any work at all. This is why it is very important to let them know that doing schoolwork in a private school is not okay and that there are better ways that they can do their homework.

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The rights of international students at work

International students have the opportunity to work in Australia while studying. It can be a great way to experience the local culture and connect with the community.

On this page:

International students have the same workplace rights and protections as anyone else working in Australia.

Here’s what you need to know before starting to work in Australia:

• You must be paid at least the minimum wage​
• ​You must pay tax on your income
• You must receive a payslip
• From 1 July 2023, you can work up to 48 hours every fortnight during term time (unless you are a PhD and master's by research student), and unlimited hours during your holiday breaks.
• If you were already working in the aged care sector on 9 May 2023, you can continue to work unrestricted hours in the aged care sector until 31 December 2023.
• Casual work means you don’t have a fixed number of hours every week.

International students can contact the Fair Work Ombudsman for help if they’re having workplace issues, without fear of their visa being cancelled. This could be for issues such as not getting the right pay or other entitlements, like leave or notice.

Check out the video below to see how the Fair Work Ombudsman can help international students.

Download the work ready fact sheet to learn about your rights at work and help you prepare for working in Australia.

Case Study – Felipe’s story

Felipe shares his story about how the Fair Work Ombudsman helped increase his awareness of workplace rights, including busting a common workplace myth. Felipe’s story is based on a true story.

The video provides information to international students on their workplace rights and the assistance which the Fair Work Ombudsman can provide them.

Are your work rights at risk?

• ​International students have the same workplace rights and protections as anyone else working in Australia, but sometimes your work might not feel right.
• How do you know if your rights are at risk? How do you know if your rights are at risk? Download the warning signs flyer to learn about the warning signs of workplace exploitation.
• If you think you are not being treated fairly at work, talk to your boss or contact the Fair Work Ombudsman for help. There is free advice in multiple languages for anyone working in Australia. Phone - 13 13 94   Online -  Fair Work Ombudsman

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10 things you won’t believe are illegal in Australia

Australia is known as an easygoing place, but there is actually a whole bunch of acts you had no idea were against the law here.

Tired woman’s horror find in stomach

Man covered in tar’s miraculous survival

The 31 minutes that exposed a liar

Australians like to see themselves as the laid-back type, unfazed by most and not prone to wowserism. But our laws reflect something entirely different.

There are many strange and eyebrow-raising crimes on the books in Australia.

Some are old laws that are probably due for repeal, others have been recently upheld as valid despite seeming out of place.

Here are just some things you won’t believe are illegal Down Under.

1. PSYCHICS

Plan on starting a business divining the future or speaking to the dead? Consult your crystal ball (or qualified legal professional) first!

Fortune-telling and mediumship are illegal in the Northern Territory and South Australia .

South Australia has the broadest ban prohibiting “a person who, with intent to defraud, purports to act as a spiritualist or medium, or to exercise powers of telepathy or clairvoyance or other similar powers”.

The offence comes with a hefty $10,000 fine or the risk of two years’ imprisonment.

Didn’t see that coming, did you?

Sorry to say, but your favourite pastime might be illegal. Under Australia’s national classification laws , films depicting actual sex between consenting adults are subject to an X18+ classification.

However, X18+ films can only be exhibited or sold in the ACT or the Northern Territory. In every other jurisdiction, sellers and exhibitors risk a hefty fine.

The X18+ classification is also only reserved for the most vanilla of sexual acts. Fetishes such as the dripping of candle wax (actual words in the classification guidelines) are too saucy for Australia and are outright banned from smutty films.

Oh yeah, porn is also not allowed on the internet . Don’t tell anyone!

3. BAD MUSIC

Are your ears bleeding from some scruffy guy’s poor rendition of Wonderwall ? The Northern Territory has got you!

A $200 fine applies in the Territory to people who “play musical instruments so as to annoy” . Most other jurisdictions have laws allowing buskers to be moved on if not approved by local council.

If only we could get a national ban on Kings of Leon covers.

4. PAID PUNCH-ONS

Fancy yourself as a slightly pudgier Tyler Durden? Well you better stick to the first rule of Fight Club in South Australia.

A $750 fine applies to a person who accepts a challenge to fight for money or engages in a prize fight. Exceptions apply to recognised professional sports and licensed venues.

To some this may seem like a reasonable restriction for public wellbeing, but I’m taking this on as a nanny state issue and developing conspiracy theories about the unethical influence of Big Jujitsu. #PrizeFightersArePatriots.

While some of these laws have been funny, this just seems cruel. Most jurisdictions in Australia (except Western Australia and NSW) have criminal offences attached to begging for money.

Criminalising begging is something that homelessness organisations say punishes people for being poor and can further entrench risk factors for poverty.

Many of these offences ostensibly come with hefty consequences, such as the risk of 12 months’ imprisonment in Victoria .

Keep it in your pants! All jurisdictions have laws against public indecency and sexual exposure, which, I’m sorry to say, includes exposing your rump.

Victoria implemented a specific offence for this kind of exposure in 2016, banning “behaviour that is indecent, offensive or insulting includes behaviour that involves a person exposing (to any extent) the person’s anal or genital region”.

The offence also deals with the issue of public streaking, long a hobby of drunken idiots across the continent.

7. TACKLING PIGEONS

Yes, you read correctly.

Now seen as a pest, the domestic pigeon was once quite useful as a communication device and this is still reflected in some jurisdictions.

In South Australia , a person who kills, injures or takes any homing pigeon (or enters a land with the intent to do so) is guilty of an offence. Similar offences apply in Victoria carrying a fine.

8. OBJECTING AT WEDDINGS

Have a good reason as to why the bride and groom shall not be wed? Keep your mouth shut in South Australia or risk two years in prison.

It is an offence to intentionally obstruct or disturb a wedding or funeral in SA and the punishment is a hefty one!

The offence only applies during the actual service, so if you do think the groom is a bit of a knob, I’d raise your objection at the engagement party.

9. LASER POINTERS

While commonly seen as a mildly amusing toy for kids, laser pointers are treated like deadly weapons in most Australian jurisdictions.

In Tasmania and NSW , merely having a laser pointer on you “without a lawful excuse” carries a hefty fine. Other jurisdictions are concerned about dangerous misuse including shining the laser at cars or planes.

The lesson? Keep your lasers at home in a locked safe so they won’t get misused by hoodlums.

10. SWEARING

Well, *&!@!

Despite being a country that has almost colloquialised the c-word, all jurisdictions in Australia have laws against “offensive language” in public. What constitutes offensive language depends on context and culture.

Luckily, offensive language seems to be changing over time. We can thank gay rights activists for reclaiming the word “f**k” into the public parlance with a 2015 judgement indicating that signs during a protest that told right-wing politician Fred Nile to “f**k off” were fair game.

— Jarryd Bartle is a lawyer turned consultant and writer on sex, drugs and crime.

When a healthy mum got so tired she couldn’t get out of bed, major alarm bells rang. She had no idea something was lurking “inside” her.

Horrifying photos show how a man was left completely covered in tar after he fell into a toxic pit of the asphalt.

David Briscoe fooled the US media by claiming he was a hero teacher at a school shooting. But one local reporter exposed the truth.

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Working in Australia: Your rights explained

In this guide, we’ll cover what type of work is available, what you can expect to get paid and what your work rights are.

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26 October 2022

In Australia, international students can work while studying. This can help with living costs and give you the work experience and networks you need to prepare for graduate employment.

As an international student, you are protected by the same rights as all Australian workers, but there can be restrictions on how many hours you can work. These limits, or ‘caps’ are designed support you to have enough time each week to succeed in your chosen course of study.

Are international students allowed to work in Australia?

Yes, international students can and do work in Australia. There are plenty of work opportunities available. Positions in businesses such as cafes, restaurants and retail outlets are popular because they have flexible schedules which can complement class timetables. 

Working hour restrictions

The number of work hours allowed during study terms and semesters is  48 hours per fortnight.

You should  regularly check your visa conditions  to ensure your working hours align with what your visa allows.   

Types of work 

Typically, there are  three types   of employment in Australia:

Your employment contract must specify which of these working arrangements applies to your work. 

Part-time and casual work is the most popular option for international students, as these allow for flexible working hours that can adjust to changes in study load or class timetables.

• Casual work: A casual worker has signed an employment contract specifying their hourly wage. However, their hours can change week by week. Hourly pay for casual work is higher because there are no paid leave entitlements. For example, if you call in sick as a casual worker, you won't get paid for the hours you were supposed to work.
• Part-time work: A part-time worker usually has set hours and days each week and can access paid leave (such as a set number of paid sick days or holidays). Part time workers often work two or three days per week. 
• Full-time work: A full-time worker works a set amount of hours each week, usually between 35 and 38 hours per week. A full-time worker is entitled to a set amount of paid holiday and sick leave - they will still get paid if they take a holiday or a day off because they're unwell. 

Getting paid (and income tax)

You are entitled to receive  payment for work  unless you have specifically offered to  volunteer . This payment must be in line with Australian minimum wage laws. The minimum wage in Australia is reviewed each year.  Check for the latest minimum wage here. 

When you start applying for jobs you will need to register for a  Tax File Number.  Depending on how much you earn, you may need to pay  income tax  and then file a ‘Tax Return’ after the end of each financial year (30 June each year). You can also apply for an income tax refund before you leave Australia by lodging a Tax Return.

You are entitled to receive your pay into a bank account of your choosing and to receive a payslip (documenting your pay) within one working day of receiving your pay.

Superannuation

Superannuation (super) is a way of saving money for retirement, but even student visa holders are entitled to ‘super’ contributions from employers. These are paid directly into your chosen superannuation fund at a minimum of 9%of your ordinary earnings. When you permanently depart Australia, you are eligible to access this money that has been saved on your behalf. You can find out more on the  ATO website.

Use the Fair Work Ombudsman's  pay and conditions tool  to determine if you're being paid the correct wage. 

Your rights as a worker

As an international student, you have the same working rights as all other workers in Australia. These rights also apply to  volunteering , internships and other work experience opportunities. You can learn more about how volunteering and internships work in Australia at the  Fair Work Ombudsman  website. 

No matter what kind of work you engage in while living and studying in Australia, make sure you  know your rights . You can contact the  Fair Work Ombudsman  if you have any concerns. You are always allowed to ask for help and this will not affect your visa status. 

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Your work rights explained.

Australia's workplace laws and regulations protect the rights of all workers, including international students working part-time on a student visa.

Get help from the Fair Work Ombudsman

Find out how the Fair Work Ombudsman helps employers and employees, including international students, understand their rights and responsibilities under Australian workplace laws.

Identifying workplace issues

Find out about potential workplace issues that you can avoid by knowing your rights.

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Is Homework Illegal? (Arguments In Support and Against)

Homework is not illegal in the United States.

But from a legal standpoint, it is a really fun argument to make!

In this article, we’ll cover some points that you could use for or against the question of the legality of homework, whether you are the student, parent, or teacher in this debate.

Is Homework Illegal? (FOR and AGAINST)

The contents of this web page are for informational purposes only, and nothing you read is intended to be legal advice. Please review our  disclaimer about law/legal-related information on this website  before taking action based upon anything you read or see.

Legal vs Illegal vs Unconstitutional

To make the argument that something (like homework) is illegal, there needs to be a law or statute or case precedent or SOMETHING that is the basis for the alleged illegality.

People have argued that homework is illegal because it counts as a form of “slavery.”

And since “slavery” was abolished by an amendment to the constitution, it is therefore “illegal.”

This argument fails.

It is illegal to restrict/control with force the movement/life of other individuals if you do not have authority to do so (as parents do with their minor children).

It is illegal to commit the other acts slavery is well known for (assault, harassment, and more).

And the individual statutes (state and federal) addressing those specific acts are the basis for the conclusion that something is “illegal” and “legal.”

Not everything that would be unconstitutional (or goes against the stated words in the constitution) would be considered illegal, and vice versa.

Instead, if you were going to make the argument that homework was illegal, you’d be better off consulting the various statutes that make certain conduct illegal.

For example:

Let’s accept that homework is an act, and that the victims do not want to commit or engage in this act, and the victims (students) only do the act because of the threat of some other result (punishments, consequences, etc).

Perhaps then you could argue that forcing kids to do homework is an illegal act, assuming that the threats of consequences are coming from an individual or entity that does not have legal authority to provide the threatened punishments, or those punishments are themselves illegal.

Sounds a lot like the crime of coercion , doesn’t it?

If you want to argue that homework is illegal, look for a statute like coercion to support your argument.

And if you want to use the 13th amendment in support of your case against homework, argue that homework is “unconstitutional” rather than “illegal.”

But if you want to argue more about the constitution, you could argue that homework infringes the rights contained in the 14th amendment to the constitution which present the state from depriving any person life, liberty , or property.

Children under the age of 18 surely qualify as “any person.” And they have a right to “liberty” which homework surely infringes.

Consent As The School’s Defense

One of the arguments that homework is illegal or constitutes slavery is that the children do not want to do the homework.

They are being made to do it.

They did not agree to do the homework.

But here’s the thing.

People under the age of 18 in the United States cannot make most decisions for themselves.

While the children may be in school against their will, and the homework is against their will, their parents or legal guardians have consented.

The parents have agreed on the children’s behalf to the homework.

Thus, technically, because the parents have voluntarily sent their children to the school, the parents have voluntarily consented to the homework, and the consequences of not doing the homework.

The child might not consent to the homework, but in the end, the parents have given their agreement.

The parents take the children to the school.

No one is pointing weapons at them to make them.

The parents sign their names to forms.

No weapons there either.

And since a crime like coercion requires that the act (the homework) be an act against the will or interest of the victim, a case cannot succeed because the will of the parents is substituted for the will of the child.

Arguing That Parents Did Not Consent

We just talked about how a debater could argue that homework is not illegal or against the will of the child because the parent’s will is substituted for the child’s will.

But what is the consent of the parent was not voluntary?

What if the parent was coerced to send their child to school, or to the homework?

What is sending their kids to school (and to do homework) was involuntary?

In most states, there are laws covering the attendance of children at school.

Absent an exclusion or a valid reason to opt out (like homeschool), a parent could face criminal prosecution if he/she does not send a child to school.

Think of what it means to make a voluntary decision.

It involves a lot of free will, and no pressure or undue influence.

If the school were to argue that the parents consented for the children to school (and then the homework), the argument against the consent is that the parents cannot voluntarily consent to the homework.

Parents are under the threat of fines and jail time.

Their consent is being obtained essentially by force.

A weapon of a different kind.

After all, a parent who goes to jail might lose his job, his driver’s license, or maybe even custody of his children.

A parent who goes to jail might lose his right to vote, or his position/status in society.

A person cannot consent at the business end of a weapon.

State Laws Do Not Compel Homework, Just Attendance

Another fun wrinkle in this argument, especially as we get down into whether parents have consented or can consent to homework, is whether the applicable laws have any impact on homework.

A student is not lawfully required to do homework.

If you look at the laws about education, there are laws about parents sending their kids to school.

There are laws about kids actually going to school.

But are there any laws that require children to complete the homework.

Like really?

I mean, doing homework is important to getting a good grade.

But aside from showing up at school (and not hurting or disrupting others), can schools actually make children do homework?

Schools can implement consequences for failing to turn in homework.

But they can’t physically punish a child (like hitting him, in most cases), or prevent him from eating or drinking while at school.

And once the child is at home with his homework, he is subject to the will of his parents or legal guardians.

Browse our  free legal library guides  for more information.

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The billion-dollar industry helping students at major Australian universities cheat online assessments

While Australia sleeps, Ramesh is flipping cheeseburgers.

He works the overnight shift at a fast-food shop. It's tedious, exhausting work, and when he clocks off at 7.30am, he needs to dash across town to sneak through the door for a 9am lecture.

Most days he never makes it.

"I'm always late, you physically cannot do it, if you're working all night, you cannot come to 9am class."

He borrowed $50,000 to pay for his university degree, which means he literally can't afford to fail.

But he also can't afford to lose his job. And, being an international student, he doesn't have access to Centrelink support like his domestic-student counterparts.

"You have to perform, you have to hustle and you have to not let people down."

In his desperate attempt to juggle work and study, Ramesh has found a solution. He cheats.

"It's not just a temptation, you have to do it to pass exams," he says.

International students are over-represented in cheating statistics.

Ramesh doesn't want to use his real name, fearing repercussions from his university.

He isn't worried about getting caught, because he says everyone's doing it.

 "You don't get caught … you're at home and there's no supervision, so there's no chance of getting caught."

And in the post-COVID era of online assessments, he has some powerful new allies — billion-dollar companies which have been accused of being industrialised cheating factories.

They market themselves as study aids, but they profit enormously from helping students cheat, and they boomed during the pandemic with the shift to online learning.

In a single month in 2020, cheating websites received around 7.3 million clicks from Australian students, an increase of 50 per cent on 2019 figures, according to Australia's academic integrity regulator.

Since then those monthly hits have fallen back but still remain above pre-pandemic levels at 5.9 million hits.

And one of the biggest players is a company called Chegg.

Study time, crunch time, anytime — the Chegg solution

Background Briefing had a go at using one of these websites. This is an example of a real nursing assessment question from a Queensland university, found by the ABC online. And you don’t need to know a thing about nursing to get it right.

"A 102-year-old female nursing home resident reports to her nurse on a monthly check-up that she is feeling progressively more lethargic … which endocrine condition is she most likely to be suffering from?"

Simply copy and paste the question on to a “homework help” website, and before long an answer pops up.

"Option C is the correct answer. She is most likely suffering from diabetes mellitus."

The website is called Chegg and a quick search reveals students from all of Australia's major universities are using it.

For little more than a Netflix subscription, students can upload questions, and get the correct answers in minutes.

Many are uploading questions in the middle of exams, sometimes in defiance of anti-cheat software designed to catch them out.

"Chegg is not a legitimate student service, they primarily provide cheating services," says Professor Phillip Dawson, an expert in academic integrity from Deakin University.

"Their profits come from helping students to cheat and I would be amazed if they don't know this."

The company's takings have grown spectacularly over the pandemic. This year, Chegg is expecting to rake in $1.1 billion in revenue — nearly double what it was bringing in before the pandemic.

Every month, around 30 million people visit the website, and it has around 7.8 million subscribers — that's more than three times what it was before the pandemic.

The company is worth around $3.7 billion, and it expects to just keep growing.

Chegg declined an interview but a spokesperson told the ABC the company takes cheating seriously and is "deeply committed to academic integrity".

"We take any attempts to misuse our platform extremely seriously.

"We make our terms of service, including our extensive honour code, very clear to our users and we also cooperate with official university investigations into allegations of cheating."

It doesn't endorse the use of its services to cheat, but it does champion the student cause.

According to Chegg, students are increasingly older, overworked, underpaid and therefore discriminated against by an inflexible university system that fails to support them.

"You're dealing with entrenched institutions who, despite what you think they're supposed to do, do not focus on the needs of the student," Chegg's chief executive, Dan Rosensweig, said during an interview in March.

"[Our services] are for students who historically have been ignored, under served, they're predominantly women, they over-index people of colour, they over-index people living pay cheque to pay cheque. We're built for people who need high-quality, low-cost, on-demand support, at two in the morning or two in the afternoon."

Universities 'probably not going to win'

Kane Murdoch is the manager of Complaints, Appeals and Misconduct at Macquarie University, and he's pretty blunt when asked about the level of cheating being detected.

"I'd say we're probably detecting a fairly low amount," he says.

He divides time into BC and AC — Before Covid and After Covid. He says cheating services are evolving faster than universities' attempts to stop them.

"If we fail to change our assessments fundamentally, not just kind of fiddling at the edges … we're going to be engaged in that race and we're probably not going to win," he says.

"We need to change our structures and our systems to effectively reduce the impulse to cheat".

There's a lot at stake. He says one of the main things the public expects from universities are high-quality graduates.

"If we can't assure the public that the students that come out of our halls are who we say they are, I think that's a dark path to go down," he says.

Some universities have turned to online anti-cheat software to catch and deter the cheats. One 2020 study found that half of all Australian universities used some form of surveillance during exams.

Students download software onto their personal computers and then consent to be watched through their webcam.

Their behaviour is monitored for any unusual activity. Sometimes a real person is even at the other end of that webcam watching the student.

But there's little research to show whether these types of software effectively detect cheating. Murdoch questions whether they work at all: "I don't think they're very good at picking up cheating".

He says the software mistakes normal behaviours for cheating, which creates a huge workload for universities that have to wade through many false positives.

"If we think about sitting in a room doing an exam — a normal sit-down exam — we might stare at the ceiling, we might kind of breathe weirdly, we might turn our head, we're not sitting there staring rigidly into a screen," he says.

"Universities just don't have that people power to be able to sit there and review that, they'll very quickly become bogged down."

Murdoch also believes the software is a gross invasion of privacy. He's heard stories of students being "surveilled" in busy households with children running around, or in the car park of a fast-food outlet with free wifi, or, mostly, in their bedrooms.

"I can understand that students would be deeply uncomfortable about the idea of an unknown commercial entity or the university having that level of kind of surveillance — a view into their own home," he says.

"That'd be deeply problematic and I'm against it simply for that reason, let alone all the others."

'It's a longer process than everyone would like'

Two years ago, in September 2020, the federal government announced its solution to online cheating.

"We have made contract cheating a crime," said then education minister, Dan Tehan.

"Organised cheating threatens the integrity of our universities and undermines the hard work done by honest students."

A suite of new powers were handed to the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency, including the ability to apply to the Federal Court to block websites it suspects of providing cheating services.

The timing could not have been better. As the pandemic took hold and teaching moved from campus to university, students were accessing cheating websites in record numbers.

The agency built up a database of 2,333 suspected commercial academic cheating service websites, of which 579 sites were targeting Australian students.

But since those laws came into effect, the agency has only blocked two websites.

The head of TEQSA's academic integrity unit, Helen Gniel, says those websites were test cases and that the agency is now in a good position to be taking some "far more pervasive action" in coming weeks.

"It may look like only two websites have been blocked, [but] there's been a tremendous amount of work that the team's been doing in the background with a view to undertaking some pretty significant enforcement action in the coming weeks.

"… It's a longer process than everyone would like, of course, but it's really important that that process does have integrity and that we're blocking the appropriate websites,"

But website blocking is not a complete solution, with Dr Gniel conceding students can easily bypass the block using a VPN.

"We're certainly aware of the limitations of website blocking … I think it's still a really important act to take."

'It's no different than a textbook'

University of Adelaide MBA student, Yegs, is exhausted.

"Yesterday, I studied until around 2am and woke up at 9am," she says.

"I feel like sometimes I'm really trying to fit a 46-hour schedule into a 24-hour day, and that's if I don't sleep, by the way."

She has midterm exams coming up and they're worth around 30 per cent of her grade.

To help study she uses "quiz banks" — databases of questions used by universities for exams and assignments.

Universities often recycle questions from one year to the next, and the answers can make their way into quiz banks.

As a result, they are not just practice questions, but often the actual questions used in exams.

Deakin University's Dr Phillip Dawson says quiz banks are highly problematic.

"They definitely cross a line," he says.

"It is cheating to have the exam answers while you're studying, that's not the way the exam was designed."

Yegs sees the use of quiz banks as no different to a textbook. Her most recent exam was open book.

"If I want to find an answer to a question … I just search for it in the textbook and it comes up word for word — we don't constitute that as cheating."

She says she doesn't use the quiz banks to cheat, but instead completes her exams the old fashioned way, using her knowledge and skills.

But she can understand why some students might use them during an exam, and she doesn't have a problem with it.

She feels like universities are more competitive than ever, and the odds are stacked against international students like her.

"I'm competing against domestic students which, in most cases, employers prefer. I have to make sure that all aspects of my resume are perfect, including my grade-point average."

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What it’s like to live and work illegally in Australia

Associate Professor, Criminology, Monash University

Disclosure statement

Marie Segrave receives funding from the Australian Research Council. This piece is based on research findings from an ARC DECRA project: ARC DE1411279.

Monash University provides funding as a founding partner of The Conversation AU.

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As I sat around a table with eight men, all illegal workers ranging from their early 20s to 40s, one said:

We don’t want to spend the rest of our lives here. We just come here for money to assist our people back [home]…. So, maybe most of us here we will eventually go back. But what we are coming here for is, basically for money.

These men were some of the 46 people who agreed to speak to me for ongoing research on illegal workers in Australia. I found these workers were motivated to take the risks they do, because of the assurance or hope they will stay long enough to make money to send home.

Another woman told me:

I’m a widow woman…So that’s why I come over here and look [for] some work to help my kids in their school to help them out in their needs. To support my kids.

Most of the people I spoke to came to Australia on a tourist visa with no work rights. Some workers told me about agents outside of Australia who target people who cannot afford a working visa or who don’t have the means to apply. For example, a retired teacher in her mid-50s, told me:

They advertise and then when we read the first time, honestly, I read the paper, I said ‘it’s good’. It’s very big money…I said ‘oh, this is my chance of going to Australia…’

This women and her husband borrowed the A$8,500 to pay an agent for her to come to Australia to work while her husband, who was not yet retired, remained at home. She didn’t realise until she arrived in Australia that in fact she had travelled on tourist visa which didn’t allow her to work.

This also happened to another young man I spoke to who travelled on a tourist visa to work in Australia on the promise of work. When the promise of a job fell through, he became destitute. His parents had died a few years ago, and he was solely responsible for his two sisters who were 18 and 19 years of age.

These agents profit significantly from providing this ‘service’, but they appear to provide both false and misleading information and they act with impunity.

The situation of illegal workers

There is actually very little data about the size, scope and experience of those working illegally in Australia. It is extremely difficult to quantify how many people are working in Australia without the legal right to do so. The best estimate is the 2011 Stephen Howells report reviewing the Migration Amendment (Employer Sanctions) Act 2007, which referred to between between 50,000 and 100,000 unlawful migrant workers.

Illegal workers in Australia tend to be found in situations where there are a lot of them, working in one area. The exact number of unlawful workers in unknown. In May this year at Senate Estimates, it was estimated that of the 64,600 non-citizens who had overstayed their visa, approximately 20,000 were working unlawfully .

However this does not account for the large numbers of people in Australia on visitor visas at any one time (a fraction of whom may be working despite having no work rights attached to their visa).

The current effort to locate these workers is piecemeal. Often this occurs via compliance measures in certain industries and other targeted raids. This skews the statistics, so many think these workers are predominantly in horticulture or other seasonal work. I have spoken to workers and those who support workers across industries including hospitality, massage, and the automative industry.

The majority of the research has taken place so far in Victoria, but workers I interviewed have worked across Australia at various times. Much of the information is not included (i.e. where the interviews took place and the nationality of workers) to protect the identity of workers.

I found widespread exploitation often by contractors and some employers. What all of my interviewees recognised was that if they left their job or complained, they risked being reported to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection, and being sent home. One said to me:

[we] just accept whatever wages paid. Of course [we] feel that it’s a bit low but [we] have no choice, [we’ve] already made [the] decision to come to look for job here [without work rights].

Another worker reported being employed by a contractor and waited three months without being paid before eventually having to move on, without pay.

As these workers are often removed from Australia when they are discovered, with no evidence of any effort to find out about conditions of work in Australia, these practices are largely unidentified and not addressed.

The response to illegal workers

Regulation of migrant labour exploitation can only ever be partially achieved, if we continue to have a two-tiered system where unlawful workers are guaranteed no rights.

The Australian government has already committed significant resources via the Migrant Workers’ Taskforce and other programs recognising modern slavery and trafficking. However, to end exploitation in Australia, we need to have a zero tolerance to exploitation, rather than a zero tolerance to breaches of visas by migrants.

We should be empowering these workers to report their conditions and employers without fear, so that we get a better picture of their situation.

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The Australian government wants to stop online harm fuelling violence and division. What can it do?

Age verification technology and a ‘tech tax’ are among the proposals to address misinformation and misogynist content

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The Albanese government says “doing nothing is not an option” in the face of the online harms highlighted by April’s Sydney stabbings and the crisis of violence against women.

But after saying it would do something , determining exactly what the government will actually do to further regulate the big tech and social media space is still an open question.

The federal government has numerous reviews, consultations and processes ongoing in various parts of the tech sector – some likely to come back and be resolved in coming weeks, others with results not expected until much later in the year. As the government considers how to address online misinformation and misogynist violent content, it has a plethora of recent suggestions about what could be done.

Here are some avenues of tech reform the federal government could pursue.

1. Age assurance technology

In its announcements on men’s violence on Wednesday , the government said it would provide budget funding for an age assurance technology pilot “to protect children from harmful content, like pornography and other age-restricted online services”.

“The pilot will identify available age assurance products to protect children from online harm, and test their efficacy, including in relation to privacy and security,” it said.

The idea has been mooted for some time, but previously rebuffed by the government. In a March 2023 report, the eSafety commissioner suggested a “roadmap on age verification”, including measures to prevent harm from pornography to children. In an August 2023 response, the government did not take up the call, saying age verification technology was “immature, but developing” at the time.

The response said any such program must work reliably without circumvention, be able to be comprehensively implemented including where such content is hosted outside Australia and balance privacy and security risks while not introducing further privacy risks.

“Age assurance technologies cannot yet meet all these requirements,” the government response read, noting that a decision to mandate age assurance “is not ready to be taken”.

Wednesday’s pilot study announcement will “identify available products” and whether it now is able to be implemented.

A key sticking point would be how much personal data, such as identity documents, a person would have to supply – either to online platforms, third-party platforms or a centralised government database – to verify their age.

2. Misinformation code

The communications minister, Michelle Rowland, on Tuesday said the government would introduce its contentious bill on online misinformation “later this year”. The bill – released as a draft last year but withdrawn after a backlash over free speech – was the first remedy raised by the Albanese government after harmful misinformation spread online following the Bondi Junction and Wakeley stabbings.

Rowland said the government was having “constructive consultations with a number of parties” ahead of releasing the updated draft bill.

“I think more than ever, the events that have gone on in terms of the stabbings in Bondi but also in western Sydney have highlighted how important it is to hold the platforms to account for their systems and processes that should address the spread of harmful misinformation,” she said.

Soon after the Wakeley and Bondi Junction stabbings, Rowland told the Nine newspapers “doing nothing is not an option for any responsible government”.

3. News media bargaining code

The government is under pressure to designate Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, TikTok and X under the news media bargaining code, which would compel those social media companies to negotiate deals with mainstream media outlets for the benefit they derive from news content on their platforms.

The Greens’ communications spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, says the government should designate the platforms. The assistant treasurer, Stephen Jones, is awaiting advice from Treasury and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) about the effect of changes on news outlets and the social platforms.

Jones said social media companies had a “social responsibility”, including to carrying news on their platforms. He added it would be “anti-democratic” if Facebook, for instance, repeated its 2021 behaviour in entirely removing news content during negotiations.

4. Regulate algorithms and recommender engines

Several government processes looking at online reform have raised concerns about how social media algorithms serve harmful or violent content to users. A meeting of the online harm ministers criticised “algorithmic recommender systems that push content from ‘influencers’ who perpetuate harmful gender stereotypes and condone violence against women” – while the terms of reference for the Online Safety Act review lists recommendation engines among the “harms raised by a range of emerging technologies”, alongside artificial intelligence and end-to-end encryption. Recommendation engines are central to the personalisation of online content.

Guardian Australia understands the government is considering whether reforms to the Online Safety Act and the eSafety commissioner’s powers could compel social media platforms to block young people from seeing harmful or violent content.

5. Further limits on online abuse

The eSafety review also raised the prospect of amending regulations around cyberbullying of children, non-consensual sharing of intimate images, cyber abuse of adults, or changing rules around material that depicts abhorrent violent conduct.

After the Wakeley church stabbing, and the eSafety commissioner’s federal court action against X for hosting footage of the attack, the government is expected to closely consider whether those rules are fit for purpose.

6. A digital ‘coordination body’

Stepping into more novel approaches, a 2023 report of the Senate economics committee looking at the influence of global digital platforms received submissions suggesting a kind of overarching regulator for the tech space.

Chaired by the Liberal senator Andrew Bragg, the report recommended the federal government “establish a digital platforms coordination body”, raising concerns about “fragmentation” and overlap between current regulatory schemes, some with “competing priorities”.

The report noted Greens senator David Shoebridge’s complaint that there was “no lead agency” in many areas. Some submissions called for greater resourcing of existing regulators such as the ACCC or the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner. Others called for a new regulator with specific digital expertise, or a new parliamentary committee dedicated to online issues.

The government response to the committee view noted ongoing work to strengthen existing processes.

7. A ‘tech tax’

To further regulate the online platforms, Hanson-Young has also called on the government to “tax them properly”, as well as setting up new rules for owners.

“Comprehensive media reform is needed to ensure we have media regulation that is fit for purpose and covers both the tech giants and modern media corporations. A ‘fit and proper person test’ should be enforced for large media proprietors and social media giants,” she said recently.

There have been suggestions higher taxes could be used to directly fund public interest journalism.

The Asia-Pacific Development, Diplomacy & Defence Dialogue (AP4D) thinktank recently put forward a new digital platform tax , to fund news media to confront the “rising tide of misinformation and disinformation”.

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