Work cancelling annual leave

[y0rkier0se]

DP works for the Civil Service. He has a week of work booked off over Christmas, and we’ve booked and paid for a cottage for that week. He’s apparently been told today that if Brexit goes ahead on 31st October, all annual leave over Christmas will be cancelled. Does anyone know where we stand on this? Can’t afford to lose £900 on the cottage and don’t see why we should! It’s been booked for nearly a year. Don’t even think travel insurance would cover this

I work on brexit - although not as a civil servant - it's exhausting. I can't take any leave

Completely derailing your thread OP, sorry, but can’t resist the opportunity to educate, particularly if people out there think there won’t be much to do over the Christmas period. So...

The main problem at the moment is that we have no idea yet what kind of terms we’ll be working with on Nov 1st. Factories who import their raw materials don’t know, pharmacists trying to stock up, hospitals trying to staff, farmers exporting their lamb. No one knows. And even when we do know, on the 31st, it will just be very high level, not the detail. And it will be civil servants who can then start to hammer out the detail, to work out how the rules we need on staffing hospitals will effect fruit pickers or football teams. Making sure a line of policy on exports doesn’t have a negative effect on farmers, art sales, shipbuilding... And it’s not just about imports and exports and immigration. It’s everything.

And alongside that we’ll be writing guidance for the farmers and football managers and art dealers, so they know what to do and how to do it. And creating forms and web tools to let them do it. And our comms teams will be working so the people who need to know these changes do know them.
And that’s just a small amount of what will need doing, even if we get the best possible deal. We’ve got a very busy Christmas ahead of us. 😁

Yep. I know civil servants have the image of pen pushers but a lot of us are in behind the scenes roles that are essential to keep this country going. Not glamorous or life saving but essential all the same. Brexit is the biggest risk to our civil stability other than wars so yes it’s better to be prepared.

I can't see us leaving on the 31st to be honest, I think it will be extended again until next year sometime.

No update as of yet from work, but for the person saying “what work will they actually be doing over Christmas?” apparently all those of a certain grade or higher are deemed able to do a HEO position in any area so they could be drafted in to do HEO work for Borderforce etc. We don’t know as the whole debacle is unprecedented.

@y0rkier0se is it wrong that I'm pleased I don't have OH under my feet between Christmas and new year? 😂

If they are going to use a loophole, I'd suggest you do the same - could you pull a sickie? :grin

Ugh. Hating having to work nights this year on Xmas Eve and Day and NYE/Day.