Get back to the office! But why?

Ad nauseam

growstuff

Grandad This is very strange. You've been bleating on for ages about how the law protects employees. Is thus a U-turn?

I agree with you that it would be grounds for dismissal if alternative employment would be appropriate. (And I already stated that.) However, it could be challenged in the courts, if employers target an employee solely because an employee can't work in an office, when remote working is possible.

PS. This isn't just about the Health and Safety Act. This would also involve the Equality Act, about which you have previously shown you don't have a deep understanding.

growstuff I have never "bleated" in regard to any matter of employment on this forum.

I regard to "equality" in the current crisis I believe that I have covered that matter in my post @7:53 today if you read it thoroughly.

Britain has excellent regulations in regard to industrial injury or ill health incurred through an industrial process and that is covered under the Health & Safety At Work Act and the "six pack" of encompassed regulations that surrounds that act.

However, in this unprecedented crisis, much of what is being carried out falls within the realms of the Employment Rights Act 1996 and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999.

Vulnerability rather than equality is the premier consideration in the present circumstances as Britain approaches what may be the perfect industrial storm of the Covid crisis and a no-deal exit from the European Union.

Grandad This is very strange. You've been bleating on for ages about how the law protects employees. Is thus a U-turn?

I agree with you that it would be grounds for dismissal if alternative employment would be appropriate. (And I already stated that.) However, it could be challenged in the courts, if employers target an employee solely because an employee can't work in an office, when remote working is possible.

PS. This isn't just about the Health and Safety Act. This would also involve the Equality Act, about which you have previously shown you don't have a deep understanding.

Oh! I think there is logic. The logic is that the owners of office blocks risk losing a huge amount of money.

The rail companies also risk losing money (most of them already are), so there will need to be a government decision about supporting them. One way or the other, strategic planning and good brains are needed.

The employment rights of workers in Britain is already some of the weakest within the European Union member states and has been for a considerable number of years.

Any employee must have been employed for two full years with any company before they become entitled to any state minimum redundancy payment. That minimum is then is only one weeks pay for each full year of service where a worker is under the age of forty-five, and one and a half weeks pay where the employee is over the age of forty-five.

Any worker must have been employed by an organisation for two full years before they can take any case for unfair dismissal to an industrial court (industrial tribunal).

A thousand-pound deposit can be demanded from those bringing litigation by an industrial court which can be retained by that same court should the claimant lose the case.

Where a worker cannot fulfil their contracted job role due to medical reasons an employer is entitled to carry out an employment compatibility review in which all options as to an employees future with the company, including dismissal where no other option is available, can be evaluated.

In the case of a worker being highly susceptible to incurring covid-19 then that situation in itself may be grounds for dismissal if a role within a company cannot be found for that worker where the risks are reduced to acceptable levels.

The above has been the reason why the Health & Safety Executive have in many employment circumstances demanded that workplace generic risk assessments should be "weighted" where that generic assessment covers ethnic and other person known to have a higher risk of becoming very seriously ill should they incur Covid-19.

Therefore "weighting" of a numeric risk assessment for any task has to be increased by twenty to thirty percent in the instance of those with added vulnerability within the employed workforce.

However, provided that an employer carries out the above procedures an employee can be dismissed on medical grounds if any risk assessment minimum numeric parameters cannot be met by an employee and no alternative work is available which would allow him/her to meet those parameters within the workplace.

Several test case hearings (Landmark Hearings) in regard to the above are due to be heard by industrial courts. However, when those cases will get to be heard due to the current backlog in the court system is anyone's guess. There would undoubtedly then be appeals to the higher courts whatever the verdict and the whole matter could be many months if not years before a final outcome is known.

Insurance organisations carrying employers liability security have now become very involved with all the foregoing placing added pressure on all in this scenario.

There doesnt appear to be any logic in this arguement though, if a job can be outsourced to another country it wont matter whether you are doing that job at home or in the office, those decisions wont be based on where people sit. If you could argue that those private companies who are spending vast amounts on city centre premises will be at high risk of going under.

Currently, public transport is less full then usual, so it's easier to maintain social distancing and is consequently safer than it would be for those who need to use it, if everybody were back to normal working. If the government is serious about keeping infection rates low and saving lives, it makes sense to encourage some people to go back to office working, but not to force, shame and threaten them.

The government’s social distancing guidelines for England, last updated in August, say it is “at the discretion of employers” as to how staff work safely. This can be by working from home, or by making workplaces safe by following Covid-19 secure guidelines—including ensuring social distancing is maintained. The guidance says those classed as clinically extremely vulnerable “should carry on working from home wherever possible”.

The advice in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is that all people should work from home if possible.

Although this says "should" and is, therefore, not a directive enforceable in law, any employer who chose to force anybody classed as clinically extremely vulnerable to work in an office, when it would be possible to work at home efficiently, and the employee subsequently became infected, would be on extremely shaky ground. The employer could be shown to be ignoring the government's own guidelines.

If the employer were to select a person for redundancy solely on medical grounds, he/she would almost certainly be guilty of discrimination.

If the person cannot continue with a job on medical grounds because it just is not possible to work remotely, he/she must be dismissed legally with a redundancy package.

growstuff

I hope you realise Grandad that if there is evidence that employees are being selected for dismissal om medical grounds, there is a strong possibility the employer will be sued, unless there's a suitable redundancy package. If somebody is made redundant, that job ceases to exist and the person must not be replaced by somebody doing the same job. Employment Tribunals take a very dim view if employers who do not follow correct procedures.

Likewise, if an employer has staff with medical conditions which are known to put an employee at high risk of being badly affected by Covid 19, the employer must make reasonable adjustments. The employer should be making sure all staff are as safe as possible, but in the case of somebody with a known medical condition, the law could result in the employer being many tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket.

I would suggest the employer seeks advice from a properly qualified employment lawyer. Not going so could end up being very expensive for them.

This is almost certainly legislation that the Tories would like to see weakened.

What’s the betting this will be in their sights before long?

I hope you realise Grandad that if there is evidence that employees are being selected for dismissal om medical grounds, there is a strong possibility the employer will be sued, unless there's a suitable redundancy package. If somebody is made redundant, that job ceases to exist and the person must not be replaced by somebody doing the same job. Employment Tribunals take a very dim view if employers who do not follow correct procedures.

Likewise, if an employer has staff with medical conditions which are known to put an employee at high risk of being badly affected by Covid 19, the employer must make reasonable adjustments. The employer should be making sure all staff are as safe as possible, but in the case of somebody with a known medical condition, the law could result in the employer being many tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket.

I would suggest the employer seeks advice from a properly qualified employment lawyer. Not going so could end up being very expensive for them.

Thank you.
Well, we're certainly living in interesting times.

It would be good to keep this thread going so that we can watch as things evolve in workplaces.

MissAdventure

Supposing everyone who can/must/is made to go back to work does just that, grandad.

Do you think that companies may well have had their eyes opened already as to how they could shave costs down?

In other words, do you think that physically sitting behind a desk is likely to stop people from being "eased out" of their jobs now?

I'm genuinely interested, by the way. (And I enjoy a good long explanation)

MissAdventure, I believe we are in a changing world but the extent of that change in regards to Britain will depend on whether there is at least a customs agreement with the European Union which increasingly looks unlikely.

Should a no-deal Brexit come about employers will not just "shave on costs" but will take a "Cleaving Axe" to any costs that are not absolutely essential. In that, office jobs that operate directly in support of output will remain, while those that are involved with such matters as future planning etc will be axed or exported abroad.

In the above the road haulage and distribution industries demonstrated at the start of lockdown how companies can sacrifice all and place their entire emphasis on the carrying out day to day operations for in that lay the survival of the many companies.
Office staff who could play a role in the foregoing have remained behind there desks while those that could not engage in such have been furloughed and may now never return to their desks.

Recovery from the covid-19 crisis will be difficult enough for almost all companies in Britain, but should a no-deal exit from the European Union bring large-scale disruption in the supply chain then the radical action that has been carried out in the road transport industry throughout the Covid crisis will without doubt be required to be carried out in very many companies and industries across the United Kingdom if they are to survive.

In that I believe a great many office roles will disappear and should they at some time in the future reappear it may well be carried out by someone based overseas.

Supposing everyone who can/must/is made to go back to work does just that, grandad.

Do you think that companies may well have had their eyes opened already as to how they could shave costs down?

In other words, do you think that physically sitting behind a desk is likely to stop people from being "eased out" of their jobs now?

I'm genuinely interested, by the way. (And I enjoy a good long explanation)

MissAdventure

That makes sense, grandad.
Companies will do what is necessary to stay afloat, I'm sure, but isnt it also possible that they'll be looking to oust anyone who can't work from home, first and foremost?

Most of those who cannot work from home are manual workers who have to physically attend a place of work to carry out their job roles. White-collar workers that have to closely collaborate or work in support of those manual workers will be secure in their employment I believe. In that, they are the office workers whose place of employment are directly attached to distribution, processing or production centres.

However, central office staff may well be "instructed" to work from home as in that their employers can save substantial amounts of money, but as stated in an earlier post, those job roles are very vulnerable to being exported overseas saving any hard-pressed company even more in salary expenditure.

You added a stealth post, grandad.

I was talking to miss adventure.

Galaxy

And especially for women.

Galaxy??????????

That makes sense, grandad.
Companies will do what is necessary to stay afloat, I'm sure, but isnt it also possible that they'll be looking to oust anyone who can't work from home, first and foremost?

And especially for women.

For what it is worth I will give my view on what will happen in the coming months and that will sound very harsh.

Those that have worked from home and those that have been furloughed with no work whatsoever but who normally operate in their job role in collaboration or support of others will be instructed to return to their places of work. Those that cannot for various reasons will be dismissed on whatever grounds their employers can devise in terms of the lowest cost.

Those that have worked from home and are independent of having to collaborate or work in support of others will be allowed to continue to do so as that will allow their employers to reduce office space requirements and therefore costs.

However, in the very harsh commercial word Britain is now entering any job which has been demonstrated can be carried out remotely away from a central office can just as easily be carried out from New Delhi as it can from Dagenham.

The above would give a company not only reduced costs in office space but also very much reduced costs in terms of salaries. In any business that has its back to the wall financially due to the covid crisis and a no-deal Brexit, the foregoing may well be a compelling choice.

In a commercial perfect storm such decisions are inevitable and what is to the "benefit of staff" will not enter into such decisions.

Financial survival will be everything.

I'm quite astounded at the resistance to home based jobs.
There are lots of threads started about how very difficult working families find juggling it all - hence grandparents doing what is sometimes the lion's share of childcare, cooking dinners, overnight stays and all.
Here is the perfect opportunity to turn the tide back to a more manageable lifestyle (for whole families)

Yes my team deals with many many teams too, Dh 's team is in contact with pretty much every region of the country, again personal experience is not evidence.
Yes we are in for a very rough ride as a country, there isnt any evidence that this will affect companies who undertake home working more than those who dont.

Grandad
I know that this is happening. I'm talking about a job that can't be done from home.
The people who have been given notice are those who have been cruising along for years and not always pulling their weight.

Sometimes a storm is just what's needed.

Galaxy

I think you seem to think that your own experience equals evidence. There are numerous people on this thread saying the opposite, so presumably that is evidence too.

I believe that the experience of our business based on the work of the four assignment teams that we operate is the strongest evidence there is to be found.

Those assignment teams enter very many companies over the course of their operations and in that they report back on the ever growing harshness of the commercial and employment world at the present time.

The Covid-19 crisis has already weakened badly the financial resilience of very many companies. Britain now has the prospect of a no-deal Brexit the challenges of which no other nation in the world will have to meet as they recover from the Covid crisis.

In the above, it will be the businesses that become very lean and very mean who will survive. As one of our Assignment Team controllers stated on one of the very late nights we have worked in our offices this week, "unless something changes very rapidly in Britain we seem to be entering a period of a perfect storm".