to think some people would be weirdly excited if WFH came to an end?

[LoveWFH]

Why do some posters sound almost delighted at the thought of Nigel Farage stopping WFH?

There’s this tone of “that’ll teach them” whenever it comes up. As if people working from home have been getting away with something.

Here’s the practical bit though. My company couldn’t bring everyone back full time even if it wanted to. They’ve sold off chunks of the office space. Whole buildings gone. Desks gone. Leases not renewed. There literally isn’t room for everyone anymore.

Hybrid working isn’t some trendy phase. It’s how a lot of businesses are set up now. They’ve planned for it. Budgeted for it. Recruited around it.

You can’t magically create space that no longer exists.

If you prefer being in the office, fair enough. Plenty of people do. But I don’t get the satisfaction at the idea of other people losing flexibility that works for them and their employer.

How on earth has WFH caused school refusal? Whats your link between them?

He is trying to appeal to his core voters who cannot get an office job

That is amusing that a man with no job has such a strong opinion on people with jobs.

@binus,

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/feb/16/parents-working-from-home-affecting-school-attendance-ofsted-chief

Now, how about you back up your counter claim that it isn’t?!

Your husban is a fuckwit.

I always enjoy the jump to AI replacement in these discussions too. Obviously people doing AI vulnerable jobs are going to be kept on in greater numbers if they're doing it in an office, which makes them even more expensive to employ because premises cost money.

I think it's more a class thing. The people they are trying to appeal to are working-class people, who typically are not office workers so don't have a WFH option, and retired people who are often of the mentality of 'I had to bloody put up with it so why shouldn't the next generation?' It's an attack on the middle class people who'd never vote Reform.

It’s generally the people who can’t wfh home (hairdressers, retail workers, patient-facing healthcare etc) who object. I presume they think we’re all skiving off (I’m sure some do). Hybrid working is here to stay.

I didn't make a counter claim. I said you needed to back it up.

That being said, Martyn Oliver is full of shit and was rightly slagged to high heaven for this at the time. He offered no evidence at all, which isn't a surprise because there won't be any. Schools don't have the necessary data on parents work location.

@Newbutoldfather

There are many reasons behind why some young people have EBSA, but them not seeing their parents leave the house in the morning to go to work is absolutely not one of them.

@Mangelwurzelfortea ,

‘I think it's more a class thing. The people they are trying to appeal to are working-class people, who typically are not office workers so don't have a WFH option, and retired people who are often of the mentality of 'I had to bloody put up with it so why shouldn't the next generation?' It's an attack on the middle class people who'd never vote Reform’

This is such a snobby post!

Those working class surgeons, teachers, engineers etc?

Given that most of the jobs that I suspect you are thinking of are done by immigrants, I am not sure it is fertile ground for Reform.

Surpised no one has mentioned global roles being done by people in thr UK.

If that person spends 9-5UK time in the office, bookended with a commute either side, then they will not be getting timezone exposure to the US window or the APAC window. This was easily solved with WFH.

Those global roles will end up being staffed in other countries and we clip the wings of our workforce.

'left wing milks'.😂

Left wing fruit - avocados?

Anecdotal, but the younger people I know who do fully in person work are nowhere near stupid enough to fall for this. I don't think it's inherently class based.

Oh definitely !!!

Please don't bother to reply or quote me, this stuff is none of my business or interest whatsoever

And yet you bothered your arse to come onto a thread and type a response. Weird.

Theres quite a lot of overlap between school refusers and households where no one leaves the home in a routine way, either because the parent doesnt work for whateve reason or the parent is at home working

Some children suffer with anxiety that hooks itself into 'Ive left my parent at home' or 'whats going on at home', the idea that home is warm and snuggly with everyone there except you because you're at school can be anxiety provoking

There are other reasons for that anxiety but it can play out in that way. A proportion of children fear whats going on at home so conversely want to remain there during the day to keep an eye, be hypervigilant, thats not necessarily connected to WFH

Then there is the basic presentation that life 'happens' inside the home, not outside the home, we dont need to or want to go outside the home. There is quite a level of isolation, it becomes the norm that you dont leave the house to do things.

This is straight out of the Trump Bannon playbook. Want to avoid media attention over the Epstein files, threaten to invade Greenland. Cause a global diplomatic crisis.

Want to avoid attention over the Epstein files while taking out a super injunction, suggest you will end WFH if you are elected. Cue easy media headlines for a grifter who will literally say ANYTHING for attention. There will be more of this in the coming weeks, more batshit assertions of things he will do when he becomes PM....... ffs

I don't think surgeons can be working class, really. They might have been born working class but once they're doing such a high ranking professional job, I think they'd have to be viewed as middle class.
Class is a strange thing

Like pp have said it won't happen. Private companies can do what they want.

However, there is no good example to the younger generation being set,

I started work in the 1970s and the example the older generation set was smoking on the job, persistent racism and sexism, harassment, how to get away with slacking and being three parts pissed in the afternoon.

Teams just isn’t the same as a casual lunch with your boss!

The fucking hours I wasted sitting listening to my old boss bore on over a pie and a pint. If I'd had the chance to quietly eat my sandwich, get on with work and go home an hour early instead I'd have done it every single time.

Just to clarify: you have replied to someone's post on a public internet forum, so have enough interest in the matter to feel the need to put in your 2 cents, but then you ask others not to reply to you or quote you because you are not interested whatsoever?
Have I understood that right?

My irony claxon is going full volume.

Where is the evidence that there's 'quite a lot of overlap' in relation to remote working parents specifically? Presumably you mean more than one would expect for the proportion of the parenting population who have a parent always or usually wfh, as it wouldn't be news if both of these figures were 20% or whatever.

Schools do not actually have reliable access to data on where parents are working. That would be required in order to collate this with any degree of reliability.

Im surprised people (you're one of them) are so shocked or disbelieving of this information. Its easy to write him off as 'full of shit'. The people on the ground, EWOs, support officers, the courts who are dealing with fines, services to support kids back into school have all this information. Its not particularly new either, Im surprised people dont know about this or understand it.

At my work, only 36% of the total number of employees could fit in if everyone came in at the same time, we got an email about it. They’ve never been able to have everyone in, utterly ridiculous.

Flexible working is a revolution for women in the workplace and Farage hates women, as we can tell from his close links with so many of Epstein’s friends like Steve Bannon and Trump.