Civil service - will you strike?

[Probablygreen]

My department has been informed today that we must now return to the office at least 4 days a week. I only joined CS 6 months ago after applying for a role that was advertised as 60/40 hybrid (2 days in the office per week). The pay is nowhere near what I’d get in private sector but I didn’t join for that, I joined purely for the flexible benefits. We’ve already been told we’ll get a maximum of a 2% pay rise this year after years of freezes, I was willing to go along with that but I draw the line here.
I can’t afford at this moment in time to be doubling the amount I pay for parking and the amount I pay for commuting. In addition, I just don’t want my work/life balance to go back to how it was before, I was run into the ground working full time from an office, raising 2 young kids (one with SEND) and running a home. Yes, I have a partner that does 50% but he works full time too. With hybrid working I could drop off my children and pick them up 2 days a week. That will be gone now. On top of the increased commuting costs, I’ll also have to find money for childcare an extra 2 days a week. I think there’s an element of discrimination against women because, let’s be honest here, we’re the ones who will be leaving in droves because we can’t reconcile the benefits any longer.
I know there are people who don’t have the benefit of hybrid working, but that’s a choice. I chose hybrid and now it’s completely out of my control even though I have followed to the letter what was asked of us.
If you work for CS and the union ask you to strike, will you?

A lunch 'hour' - ummm I thought that had stopped years ago for a salad at the desk! In fact most people only have 29 minutes to be precise.

....so perhaps that is the problem no? Entitlement, extended lunch hours, posting all day on the internet instead of working, lack of engagement, detrimental to young people just joining, damaging the economy, poor production, poor service, lack of team cohesion, potential hacking and deep lethargy and lack of commitment. Apart from that WFH is totally ideal.......I can kind of see why JRM left the notes now...😁

www.publicsectorcatering.co.uk/news/29-minute-lunch-break-now-norm

It would probably depend who was working part time.

It’s like people are being asked to work in a sweat shop rather than go into a nice office with all the facilities. For a decent wage and excellent benefits

if I was a CS I’m not sure striking on this would be a good option….especially if you live in London and are receiving the uplifted London wage…for travel.

But civil servants and striking,….such common bedfellows. And they wonder why people in the private sector look on in disgust?

I work as a consultant (not one of those) with both big corporates and public sector

when I get a public sector client, I breath a sigh of relief such is the snails pace they work at.

its got worse over the years, the difference in pace and standards between the public and private is indescribable. Yet all I hear is how CS are exhausted and overworked. They really have it cushy compared to the private sector, very cushy. The only clients I get emailing me at all hours are from the private sector

Decent wage and excellent benefits? Yes it used to be, not the case anymore, especially for highly qualified staff who work well below market rate in the misguided belief that they are making a difference, or that someone will appreciate their efforts. Tonnes of jobs across the country on CS jobs so hopefully if its so excellent they'll be easily filled.

Because things like flexi are supposed to offset the pay and the dwindling benefits. Again there's plenty of jobs if those in the private sector want them, I suspect they wouldn't fancy the pay cut though. Work is slow usually because of archaic systems, processes and red tape. Some necessarily ie working with public money, others not so but can't be changed from the shop floor.

@Swayingpalmtrees ah - having encountered you on the Thomas Markle thread and again now, I see you must get all your ‘facts’ and opinions straight from the Daily Mail. Why don’t you run along, find some immigrants to blame for something and leave the people who actually know what they’re talking about to carrying on discussing.

We are doing two days a week at the moment but have said they will mandate four if needed. We don't have the office space for that and did two days a week max pre-pandemic so don't know how the maths stacks up.

I am quite happy to go to London twice a week so have been doing it the last few months. I am a remote worker though so have my (significant) travel costs paid and my travel time (5 hour round trip) added to my hours. I will carry on until someone realises just how expensive the 'everyone back in the office' mandate is. The Daily Mail will be happy though...

Before anyone points out the time, I am on Flexi leave today so not using work time. Flexi built up due to me travelling to the office..

It’s worth speaking to your line manager and following up with an email to HR. The job was advertised as hybrid, and that’s why you took it. You can demonstrate that having to commute 5 days a week will take a toll on your finances and your mental health. Reiterate that you would not have taken the job if you had been informed that after xx period of time you be expected to be fully office based. Personally I think they’re on shaky ground. This is very different from someone who has an office based contract.

Bloody Jacob Rees Mogg, who has never changed a nappy, and has no idea whatsoever of the difficulties of balancing childcare, household duties, and work.

Ah there is it is *hiphopotamus! I have never had the privilege of reading the Daily Mail so couldn't couldn't comment on their position, however five pages in and it is obvious why the civil service need to return to the office....and why they have now gone suspiciously quiet! Are you actually being paid by the tax payer to comment on Thomas Markle? Thought not.
Get on with your job and stop moaning and bleating.

In my company we also still get a whole hour for lunch, and breaks! 😁

And I can post all day today because I have the day off a six weeks annual leave plus bank holidays. I don't understand why you keep beating up CS and go seem to have a pretty rubbish deal of it already ....

I have the day off a six weeks annual leave plus bank holidays

Hardly a 'rubbish deal' then.
Do you actually know how privileged and entitled you sound? Try and explain your long lunch hours, perks and long holidays and pension to the zero contract worker covering 80 hours a week just to stay afloat and then we will have a conversation! Bleating about your 2 days versus 3 days WFH sounds grossly out of touch with the situation on the ground.

My point is that I am not a civil servant. I'm in the private sector - you know, the one you say is so hard and the CS will have such a jolt of reality if they leave their 'cushy' jobs to try and work in? The ones that you claim forced people back into the office back in 2020.... but I work for one of the big ones, and I know the comparable companies to mine, and I don't recognise what you're talking about. CS would have many transferable skills, likely find the flexibility they need, and not be abused day and night by daily Mail readers desperate to blame them for the economic crisis we face because they aren't buying enough overpriced sandwiches in london.

You are the one out of touch, desperate to blame the CS for not being in the office every day when you need to look a bit higher up. At the current government and PM for the situation we find ourselves in ....

@Swayingpalmtrees if you need to work 80 hours a week to make ends meet, it's not the civil service who are to blame for that. Focus your anger on the actual people responsible for the cost of living crisis, with their fiscal policies.

I'm sorry you have financial difficulties, I'm sorry it's hard. I truly am. But it's not the civil servants to blame for that. Everyone has their own set of circumstances that make things hard, OP can't accommodate working in the office more than her current arrangement because she chose that job based on her flexibility. That doesn't mean that it's her fault you have to work more hours than you should, her choice isn't the reason you have to work 80 hours.

As for the wages being shit which seems to be the premise, that also is just not true. Have a look at the gov analysis from 2019. Better off in public than private.

Better off.

By 7%.

www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/publicandprivatesectorearnings/2019

But the moaning will continue no doubt

It even says for skilled workers pay is less. As I said in my comment, so not sure what point you're making. Many people are better off in the private sector, some aren't sure, but the easy gold plated life of someone in the CS that the mail and the like enjoy spinning isn't reality. And again, plenty of jobs they struggle to fill so why not apply?

And @Swayingpalmtrees surely the answer would be to push for WFH flexibility so people stick in 80 hour weeks with zero hour contracts can apply for them and enjoy that flexibility?

Well I am just about to work a night shift, in the same place I have been throughout the pandemic. And no, we don't get the option to moan about WFH or whether to strike or not. An indulgence the rest of the country can ill afford. So I will leave you to ruminate your 2/3 days or your luxurious lunch hours that none of the rest of us have enjoyed since the 1980s, and I sincerely hope there is no one on here in charge of actual policy, or future policy for the government, because that is truly a scary thought and goes some way to explaining why they continually get it wrong.

I'm not sure how it will work, people being in 4 days a week, given that most civil service offices have been built with hot desking in mind and there are not even enough desks for everyone.

Again, don't work
For the civil service. But the question is, why don't you? Hi f they push a flexible WFH policy where appropriate, you can be anywhere and work for them, and also enjoy those benefits? Arguing against flexibility is only shooting yourself in the foot, you don't sound happy in your current employment so surely more flexibility in other roles will give you the chance to consider and move in to them?

It's not a race to the bottom. If you don't like your working conditions get another job. The more people like you roll over and allow their employer to treat them like shit the more employers will do it.

Answer seems obvious to people who say they have lousy conditions in comparison, apply for a civil service job 🤷‍♀️

A lot of you seem to think that CS hasn't changed since the 1970's!

We had 10 years of austerity when we had no pay rise or one percent & then 1 year of 1.5 and then pretty much back to a pay freeze due to the pandemic!
Our terms & conditions have been cut, our pensions have been cut, in my Department if you take a promotion you lose 1.5 days Annual Leave, show me a private company that does that?

Staff have been cut to the bone, there's so much work for too few people, we're an aging workforce & can't seem to recruit young people! lunch break - what's that?

As I said we struggle to recruit in the South-East because other local companies pay more! We did have a brief spell during the pandemic when we had loads of applicants for jobs but as soon as going back to the office was mentioned they all left again!

But against that the work is rewarding, I work with some great people, but I won't be forced back in to the office because some politician thinks I should be!