Is the boss watching, and are unions doing anything about it? Workplace surveillance regulation in Australian Enterprise Agreements*

Enterprise bargaining provides an innovative way for addressing concerns about workplace surveillance in the absence of legislative reform. This article examines how workplace surveillance is being addressed in registered enterprise agreements in Australia, and discusses the implications of those findings for the regulation of workplace surveillance. This article provides the results of the first detailed, industry-by-industry analysis of the nature and frequency of workplace surveillance clauses in Australian enterprise agreements. This article also proposes a typology for classifying the basic structure of the clauses encountered and describes the common features of each clause type. The findings provide insights on the extent to which unions are seeking to address workplace surveillance in enterprise bargaining in the Australian context. Our study is important for understanding the extent to which enterprise bargaining is providing an effective bulwark against increased workplace surveillance.