To think that you shouldn't be pissed off to work Xmas day just because you have children?

[kitya]

When your kids are 15 and over and you are in a job where unsociable hours are enough. I'm fuming that someone complained today that she was the only one with kids that was working Xmas. As if us singles don't have families we would love to be with. I'm so annoyed, she's a friend as well.

Oh god...I hope EVERYONE who wants to be off on christmas day gets to be off especially if they have kids.

Cheers! happy Honika! Etc.

Erm, before I had kids, I expected I would have to fill in over xmas hols to cover the people that had kids. I worked in a hospital, ordering medical supplies, quite a vital job. It never bothered me, I liked the women I worked with, never felt bad at the thought of enjoying xmas with their young children or even older kids. Xmas, generally, is for kids! And spending time with them is more important than work.

I work in the hotel industry and have had an absolute ball working over CHristmas and NY, but I accept that entertaining festive holiday makers if far preferable to working in a hospital with ill people....

everyone should take a turn in all fairness....who should have the right to decide whos famly circumstances are more worthy

Well, if it came to it, an industrial tribunal I suppose PBC.

What do couples who are both in jobs who have to work Xmas do about child care because AFAIK childcare doesn't usually extend over this period?

Nah wibbly, you can complain, I'm just not gonna swap shifts for you because you've got kids and I haven't.

well said Ifancy
think thats a bit extreme wibbly

"Well, if it came to it, an industrial tribunal I suppose"

An industrial tribunal is not the place to decide who has leave over xmas! Unless your employer says all parents have to work xmas day and all childless have day off, an industrial tribunal would throw your "case" out. And you would for ever be marked at work as an idiot and trouble maker.

It isn't really up to employees to have to try and organise shifts between themselves. It is up to the employer to ensure that that people with caring responsibilities, whether for children or adults, are not prevented from having enough flexibility to do their jobs for no work reason that would stand up legally, but purely because of sour grapes on the part of people who have no caring responsibilities.

I agree MillyR. But there is a difference imo to say I can't work xmas day as can't get chil care or care for my elderly relative, to saying yes DH/GPs, etc will be at home, but I want the day off to spend with my DCs. One is about caring responsibilities, the other is about making a value judgement.

My background is in the NHS and there's just no way you could only have singles working over Christmas. For safety you need a variety of levels of experience on duty at any one time. Generally (yes I know there's always an exception) the singles are younger and are therefore less experienced. Generally the more experienced people are older and therefore more likely to have children. Restricting Christmas working to singles might compromise safety.

In my departments we always used to ask people to indicate what they could work. It was publicly available, which always help shame those who asked for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day off and only offered the late shift on New Year's Day. It was also kept from year to year so that it could be compared so no one person always got Christmas Day off for example.

We had a couple of junior night staff who had fixed nights. All the years that Christmas didn't fall on their days they recited ad infinitum that their contract specified certain days. Lo and behold when Christmas fell on their days the wanted to join in with all the other staff and pick their shifts. I refused and made them work their contracted days.

If you work in an 24/7 environment you have to do your fair share.

Having said that I'm very very very happy to be my own boss now so I don't have to listen to the bickering and sniping about the Christmas off duty and I don't have to consult the exec on call rota before I open the baileys!

Yes, MillyR, but it would depend on who brought the claim. A preference for people with young children a la JeremyVile might well be considered to be indirect sex discrimination because for all sorts of reasons, many of which reflect no credit on my gender, there are many more women than men with childcare responsibilities; so the burden would fall disproportionately on men.

Don't bother with the flamethrowers; I know how that sounds. The fact is that a man who found himself working CD for the second or third year running because of the preference might win a claim.

And it would be unfair even if the employer found a way to justify it legally.

In the end it comes back to equal treatment by a rota and if your luck is out, your luck is out!

they take turns at dh's work. He worked Xmas day last year (only got back around 7pm) so he won't this year. Whoever works Xmas doesn't have to work New Year's Day and vice versa.

Seems the fairest way tbh.

You know the type of job you take will have public holiday work (it isn't only Xmas, it's Easter, New Year etc.).

Maybe they are just pissed off to work Christmas day why shouldn't they be?
there was a long thread about this a few years ago.

FWIW I always offered to work Christmas Day pre-kids, post kids I'm a lot keener on only working 'my share' IYSWIM

Fine, opt out of Xmas working - but take a salary cut to reflect you're not doing your full share of the "unsociable hours" part of the work... didn't think so huh?

And referring to people as "childfree wanking police"... then wanting them to bend over backwards to acommodate you - not likely to give them the warm fuzzies really.

Just shows what some of the assholes on here think of the childless - some kind of subhuman, no rights, no worth, unpleasant scum we wheel out when they're useful - after all their lives cannot have ANY meaning can they?

Here here Deja

Indeed Deja and what makes it sillier is that the assholes were once childless themselves and as far as responsibilities go will eventually be again!

Agreed Andrew - But I suspect some would stilll argue for priority time off to see the grandchildren.

Deja

I don't think anyone has come across as thinking that.

I'll think you'll find the deleted comment from Wibbly said exactly that. Hence it being deleted....

Indeed Lesley33 - or nieces or nephews or cousins' children or . . . where does it end?

I really don't understand why people are getting so worked up about this.

When you have children, Christmas Day becomes important for different reasons. It doesn't make parents any more important than anyone else working on that day, nor does it mean that childless people should be classed as "subhuman".

My mother worked shifts while I was growing up and worked Christmas Day. My dad also worked shifts for a while and got Christmas Day off by working New Year.

I now work shifts but am prohibited by law to work on Christmas Day. I generally ask to have Christmas Eve off but will work whatever else. Everyone else I work with also get asked for their requests and work do their best but not everyone gets what they want - that's life.

I got pissed off about working my birthday and voiced it. I got pissed off about working Valentine's Day when the singles got it off. I got pissed off about working Easter.

Just because I have a job in a 24/7 industry does not mean that all of a sudden I get to be happy about when I work. There is NOTHING WRONG with saying you're pissed off about working whenever.

Some people are taking this way too personally.