Work from home if you can should stay in place, surely?

[Ninefeettall]

Just thinking about June 21st and Boris said as recently as yesterday or the day before that 'Work from home if you can' will be scrapped from 21 June. Surely if the Indian variant is a problem (which we don't know for sure yet) then this is a really, really, really easy win? 'If you can' doesn't have to include people who need to be in the office for mental health reasons or who can't work properly from home, but there are vast numbers of young, unvaccinated or partially vaccinated office workers who have now been working from home for a year, doing their jobs perfectly well if not better who could just keep doing that and not add to the commuters or office workers spreading the variant about.

@Bluntness100

Sigh, ok I should have said for over 99.9 percent of under fifty and not vulnerable this is a totally benign virus.

You didn’t need to clarify it to me. I knew exactly what you meant but then I am not a pedant! And I totally agree with you!

I wonder if public transport companies will finally collapse.

My employer is pushing hard that we all mostly/fully WFH forever.
So that would be end of me using public transport on regular basis.

@Dongdingdong

I cannot believe how happy some are to have their lives curtailed in such a way.

IMO some people are loving their new lifestyle working from home and don’t want to go back to the office ever. They’re clutching at this new variant in the hope that it could delay their return further.

My hunch is that the variant won’t have any significant impact on hospitalisations and we will go ahead with the return to work on 21st June as planned.

I agree.

I think the media coverage and ‘oh so serious’ press conference is all about timing. 3 days before restrictions lift and they want to people to carry on being cautious. I also think it’ll go quite a long way to convincing the under 40s to get vaccinated....

In my circle the people coping the best are the ones who never stopped working out of the home or who had a mix of WFH and office. It’s those who have been at home since March 2020 who seem content to stay there forever, because of fear out of all proportion to facts.

That’s not my experience, some of us have been stuck at home since March 2020 against our will and it’s absolutely shit.

The ones who want to stay wfh are those who want to keep their overinflated London/SE salaries without the downside trade offs which came with getting them, i.e. length and expense of commute. I wish those who were apparently having their lives ruined by office life had just made some different choices earlier, because now the narrative is being set by a group of people who were happy to take the benefits before but have now seen they can save a bit of money and fuck the rest of us who hate it.

@PrincessNutNuts

Of course it should.

Everything that cuts transmission should be kept in place.

People who can working at home makes it safer for those who can't.

Yet they are removing masks from classrooms ..... A simple measure that’s still needed everywhere else.

@Dongdingdong

I cannot believe how happy some are to have their lives curtailed in such a way.

IMO some people are loving their new lifestyle working from home and don’t want to go back to the office ever. They’re clutching at this new variant in the hope that it could delay their return further.

My hunch is that the variant won’t have any significant impact on hospitalisations and we will go ahead with the return to work on 21st June as planned.

Sure a pandemic shouldn’t have to make people realise there is another way of living, and it shouldnt be used to enforce it.

But we really need to sit back and think, is a split WFH/Office the worst thing?

If that is what people want, it doesn’t impact productivity, and it makes people’s lives better, then society needs to adapt. Not grind people back down to their former selves.

Everyone working from home has had a profound economical impact on city centres. Businesses selling coffee, lunch food, general retail have all suffered already to the point where many won't be able to come back at all. Not to mention travel costs, building rentals. Not an easy solution at all.

Boris Johnson only gets worried about stuff when it is already really bloody bad. If you actually read the news about India, bodies floating in the rivers as they have run out of wood for the funeral pyres, you get a feel for the scale of transmissibility. The UK is doing well, but transmission during the vaccine roll out stage is crucial. He would be a fool to take away face masks in schools, reintroduce home visits and get rid of the wfh message, all measures that cost precisely zero and undoubtedly reduce transmission. UK track a d trace doesn't work and neither does border closures, so the only option is targeted lock downs, distancing, masks and vaccines.

I wonder if public transport companies will finally collapse.

They are all being propped up by government funding in huge amounts. Every TOC, every light rail/tram operator, every bus company. The government will have to continue that for as long as required because the alternative in many areas would be key workers just not being able to work.

Looks pretty bleak for the long term too. But hey, air pollution and excess deaths caused by that don’t matter so long as no one catches covid.

I reckon the scientists will be telling him to keep his eye on the prize, finish the vaccine roll out by October and stumble toward the finish line with lockdowns in cities and hotspots. If he manages to achieve anything like 90% uptake, assuming the variants don't evade the vaccine, it will be very very hard to find ourselves in a situation like India this winter.

I do understand people enjoying WFH
I have always been part time with lots of flexibility so have been able to be there for my children
I do think a lot of people will have to go back at some point, but ideally once they have had their second jab

Yes of course.

But we really need to sit back and think, is a split WFH/Office the worst thing?

For some of us yes. Why on earth would I want all my work shit constantly on display in the living room so I feel as though I'm living in the office? I'm sure all those who are desperate to wfh forever have the space to do so.

Working from home makes my life a misery and also DH's as he feels he can't sit in his own living room.

@lljkk

I wonder if public transport companies will finally collapse.

My employer is pushing hard that we all mostly/fully WFH forever.
So that would be end of me using public transport on regular basis.

I can't drive so I rely on public transport. It would be dire if that happened, for me and many others.

Exactly PinkSparkly. Many people’s homes and situations simply aren’t suited to WFH. Why are they never mentioned in discussions like these?

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

But we really need to sit back and think, is a split WFH/Office the worst thing?

For some of us yes. Why on earth would I want all my work shit constantly on display in the living room so I feel as though I'm living in the office? I'm sure all those who are desperate to wfh forever have the space to do so.

Working from home makes my life a misery and also DH's as he feels he can't sit in his own living room.

Same here. I felt like I was living at the office. Plus shit rural broadband made everything so much harder. We have the best package available and it still couldn't cope.

Final straw for me was work saying it's WFH for ever. I found a new job that allows office work and it's brilliant. My ex employer was absolutely gobsmacked when I said I was leaving and that it was because I didn't like WFH. Apparently everyone loves it...

@Bluntness100

“Secondly. People really need to remember that for anyone below fifty and not extremely vulnerable this is a totally benign virus. “

Totally not true. I know a family of parents of 45 and son in 20s who all ended up in hospital, father is still there and son suffering long term affects. None of them had pre-existing conditions.

"is a split WFH/Office the worst thing"

I don't like the idea we should be grateful not to be on precipice of death. Can we maybe have higher aspirations?

Not everyone has a spare office room.
Most of us don't want to live at the office.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

But we really need to sit back and think, is a split WFH/Office the worst thing?

For some of us yes. Why on earth would I want all my work shit constantly on display in the living room so I feel as though I'm living in the office? I'm sure all those who are desperate to wfh forever have the space to do so.

Working from home makes my life a misery and also DH's as he feels he can't sit in his own living room.

Oh I don’t doubt 5 days a week WFH would be shit.

I’m talking about 1-2 days WFH a week, or maybe 3 one week, none the next. Flexibility. Independence.

Once mandatory WFH is ended, it will not be the employees discretion as to what happens. If some people want to work 5 days a week at the office, then that is fine, if some want to work 4 days, then also fine.

All or nothing is just going to make some people’s lives worse.

ps: I wanted to print out some work documents yesterday.
Loads of hassle & time to get my home printer to do it.
There is a beautiful very reliable fast self-stapling photocopier-printer-scanner in the real office.
I miss the photocopier!!

@Plumedenom

But you can not compare India and the UK .it’s not all about transmission.it’s living conditions,pre-existing medical conditions, the ability and willingness to socially distance etc.

But it will be the employers discretion. I'm already seeing job adverts that require the applicant to have a suitable quiet workspace at home with good broadband. That alone will rule out anyone who has small children and a SAHP.

It's going to become another class divide.

If you actually read the news about India, bodies floating in the rivers as they have run out of wood for the funeral pyres, you get a feel for the scale of transmissibility.

A significant proportion of the cases in India are our very own home grown Kent variant. In some places in India it’s the dominant strain.

@lljkk

ps: I wanted to print out some work documents yesterday. Loads of hassle & time to get my home printer to do it. There is a beautiful very reliable fast self-stapling photocopier-printer-scanner in the real office. I miss the photocopier!!

My ex employer would not allow home printers to be connected to work laptops and we aren't allowed to email documents out. Hence no home printing available and they couldn't see how this was a problem.

Yet simultaneously requiring me to wet sign documents...

Current employer won't either but then I'm in an office so it doesn't matter.

1-2 days/week in office means hotdesking.
We have had flexi-working for 30 yrs.
But new flexi+ hot-desking regime will mean double the equipment to be purchased by employer, potentially nowhere to keep personal stuff in office so more stuff to lug back and forth. It may well mean more very large very shared offices, and lower quality equipment. Lots of employees are on short term (as in 12 week) contracts that explicitly do not include 'capital' costs such as for equipment. So who knows how our 'home' equipment will get funded.

Our employer officially makes driving to work awkward (they encourage public transport, active travel instead), especially with lots of stuff. We aren't permitted to park close to our desks. The cheapest recommended carpark is half a mile away from my current desk. The closest regular allowed carpark space is probably about 300m away. We don't have little suitcase trolleys with wheels on them issued to lug our work items around.

This parking set up actually has more free parking opportunities (a mile away from my desk) than my last job did, at least.

So the sensible choice to have all your work stuff when you need it, will be full commitment to WFH almost every day, especially if you have a spare room or space to avoid Living at the Office.