Socialising at work

[jgw1]

I have been told that many people had social gatherings at work, with cake, singing happy birthday and perhaps booze during the lockdown in May and June 2020.

AIBU to think that this is nonsense?

We certainly didn’t at my work, all our offices were closed.

Same here.

It's probably nonsense but I'm retired and even when I was working (pre covid) office parties were very unusual.

Well I work in the NHS and it's 100% not true of our department. Our staff room was only able to accommodate 4 people at a time and even the canteen was closed.

I suspect it did happen in some work places, yes. Not everyone works in big chains with HR policies etc - many people work with family/friends and wouldn't have thought twice about it, in all honesty.

I retired six months before Covid hit. There’d very occasionally be birthday cake but any consumption of alcohol had to be done strictly off premises, the only exception being prior to going out for our Christmas lunch when some prosecco and nibbles were had.

We were all furloughed, so couldn't even if we wanted to.

Key worker here, worked throughout Covid at more than one company. All activities socially distanced and masks worn when away from one’s desk. Chairs removed from meeting rooms and break rooms such that any remaining chairs were at 2m distance from each other, meeting room doors updated with signage indicating capacity of each room. Occasionally treats would be bought by one company, left in the break room for people to take at appropriate times back to their desks. There were no gatherings whatsoever.

No, many people did not do this. It's nonsense and a smokescreen to deflect what's going on...

But a pretty shit smokescreen. More like a loose haze created by a single joss-stick.

At N10, yes, we all know now that it’s happened.
Otherwise I don’t know anyone who’ve done this but all people I know were WFH .

I remember sneaking into a “closed” meeting room with a cuppa to have a chat with a friend who I hadn’t seen for six months. That was as lairy as it got and even that felt naughty. We were all totally clear that meeting up at work to socialise was banned and if someone suggested getting a few beers in in the office everyone would have looked at them like they had two heads.

Not in my workplace, the office was still closed at that point and aside from the moral element we wouldn't have risked the very obvious reputational damage of being caught breaking the rules.

I work peripherally with schools and know that when they first reopened there was absolutely none of that with teachers either. Staffrooms were either closed or in use as overflow classrooms and everyone was so stressed and overworked there was no time or energy for cake, booze etc, not that they would unprofessional enough to be drinking on school premises anyway.

We were all furloughed. I had to get a letter from my employer to go in to the office and collect up the belongings of a colleague who committed suicide.

Only a handful of people were actually allowed into her funeral, so we all stood outside, socially distanced.

So no, there were no parties or cake.

It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of smaller manufacturers/essential retailer/takeaway staff etc who'd been working in the same small space all day during lockdown had the occasional beer/birthday cake get together at the end of the day. My office was shut, but I strongly suspect we'd have done a bit of questionable socialising if we'd been in.

But those people weren't making decisions for the rest of the country. And they weren't getting up and lying to the Commons about it when they got caught. As so often it's not the crime: it's the coverup.

There are an awful lot of workplaces where even having alcohol on the premises, let alone gathering to drink it on work premises, even outside working hours, would be an immediate disciplinary matter, quite apart from Covid.

Do you mean Boris and co?

Not sure why you're asking this as EVERYONE knows that it is not true and that No10, BJ and his cronies are saying anything that will divert attention.

Yes many of my medic friends decompressed with a few drinks, they were working side by side for very long shifts, so why not?! They were honest about it at the time and no one begrudged them that, given they had spent god knows how many hours with the very same colleagues.

Many companies that had essential work forces did the same, birthday cakes were a big thing with us - Pimms on a Friday and we also did some fun quizzes and an auction etc to keep morale up. I didn't socialise outside of the rules at home, but I was an essential worker and I would be lying if I said we were not having the odd drink after work usually in the courtyard garden for someone'e birthday. Everyone I know that worked on the front line, did something similar. My teacher friends would usually have their celebrations at lunch time.

I don't really buy partygate as a result. I think the gov were doing what they needed to do to relieve the strain - and nothing different from my dh's surgeon shift. Working on the front line was extremely extremely stressful in the early days, and it is a nonsense to say you can work for 12 hours right next to someone, but you can't drink a glass of wine with the same person for 10 minutes at the end.

There were stories in our local newspaper at the time saying that council workers had been caught having parties in the council offices.

At the time the story went that they thought because they were key workers and already at work it didn't matter if they also had alcohol and snacks.

Social media was not happy as I remember.

Thinking about it I also had people working on my house summer 2020, the builders definitely had take away food together and I took out beers on a Saturday afternoon on the hot days. They were very grateful, they had give up social distancing a long time ago as they had to work together to do the job, travelling together in the van etc. Pointless to pretend, and it is the pretence of all of this that I find so nauseating. It is beyond ridiculous if you spend ALL day with other people to refuse to share a slice of cake with them. That is serious brainwashing going on, if you think that is logical. I just expected to catch covid the minute my colleagues did, as it turned out we all stayed completely well until 2021. I would also add not many people are going to own up to this op, the lynching going here would be a deterrent.

I doubt it ,most furlough or wfh and those that couldn’t police / nhs / shops they had all these strict social distancing rules in so I can’t say for certain nobody didn’t socialise at work but majority I’d say no .

I work in school and yes, we still had cake for birthdays. It wouldn't have occurred to me to think that was anything other than work.

We didn't have leaving dos though.

This is just a question, but if your all working in close proximity to each other, did your companies have specific rules for eating and drinking ect ?

For most people I know, any bending of the rules they did wouldn't have been wasted on colleagues - it would have been for friends or family.

gettingold The NHS do not have strict social distancing it is entirely unworkable. The police were the same, prison officers are required to be handcuffed to the defendants. There are some jobs that can not avoid human contact, and therefore it seems a bit silly not to share cake, chocolates or a glass of wine if you have spent all day every day with someone.