In the early days of the pandemic, it was not unusual for people to suggest that 'afterwards' things would not - could not - go back to the old normal.
Some of the old inequities, the old restrictions, had been swept away overnight, and surely we must, at least, reap these long term benefits from our temporary challenges.
More recently, some of the jostling over the details of policy - should we have a hybrid Leaving Cert this year? (yes ); How can we improve ventilation in schools? - has left little space for focusing on potential longer term benefits.
Working from home
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One obvious starting point is access to flexible working conditions, such as working from home (WFH, as it became known over the past two years ). While the Government has, with little notice, withdrawn its advice that workers should be facilitated in working from home where possible, it has, only this week, published the Heads of a Bill that would afford workers a right to request WFH arrangements.
While some employers may continue to facilitate workers in the interim, the lacunae in policy could easily have been avoided, had the Government ensured new regulations were in place ahead of the end of Covid regulations.
Unions such as Fórsa, along with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, have been pushing for regulations that would close this gap, and ensure that what is available offers proper protections for workers.
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The Government proposal has rightly been described by some as 'a right to refuse' given the expansive list of reasons given as examples of why an employer might refuse a request - with a three-month period before even that response is required. Early readings of the legislation also suggest a much-touted right of appeal to the WRC will only cover the process, and not the substantive decision on a request.
So an employer merely has to offer a reason for a refusal, and the WRC cannot enquire into whether the reason is reasonable.
Stronger framework needed
Opposition parties have called for a much stronger WFH framework. Labour senator, Marie Sherlock, has called the proposal "meaningless" and criticised the Government's lack of ambition in its proposals.
The problem, in part, is that the Government (channelling employer lobbyists ) is focused on the presumed disruption to employers from an 'all or nothing' WFH approach, ignoring both the benefits and the real need for flexible access to hybrid approaches.
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Sen Sherlock [pictured above] has for some time been championing the benefit of flexible working conditions - and the ability of workers to access them - noting they are correlated with improved worker retention and productivity. Further, she has drawn attention to the particular benefit of flexible conditions for women, noting the five per cent increase in full-time female workers in 2020 and 2021 - a time when rates for male workers stayed static, and there was a significant fall in numbers of women in part-time employment.
There are workplaces locally that offer various forms of flexible working - NUI Galway, for example, as a 'shorter working year' scheme, where workers can apply to take unpaid leave for the summer months. The popularity of such schemes, of course, can be linked back to the lack of affordable childcare in Ireland.
Impact on women
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Dr Laura Bambrick of ICTU has also voiced concerns that a restrictive WFH policy - an 'all or nothing' system - could create two tracks within workplaces, and have a gendered impact on women's prospects for retention and advancement.
There has been no evidence, over the last two years, of such gendered outcomes, when WFH has been a universal phenomenon in many workplaces. However, the current proposal - where workers are required to apply at least three months before implementation, and are then 'locked in' to the approved work pattern for 12 months or more - is likely to reinforce existing divisions in gender roles and caring responsibilities.
Insider agrees with her argument that it is important that we must continue to advocate for high-quality public childcare services, as well as ensure that access to training, progression, and promotion opportunities are equally available to those in hybrid and traditional work patterns.
Affordable childcare
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Insider is a strong advocate for a publicly-run affordable childcare system, as an important tool for supporting equal access to work, and decent working conditions for those working in the sector.
Given the problems with our market-driven system - expensive, limited capacity, precarious working conditions - it is particularly important that parents and caregivers have access to flexible working conditions if they are to juggle school holidays (and those occasional half-days that occur from time to time ), sick children, and more - but we must continue to push for an affordable, public, childcare system that serves children, workers, and parents.
Short-term response needed
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The presumption in the proposed legislation - and in those policies seen by Insider that are being drawn up by local employers - is that they are focused on long-term switches in working patterns, ignoring the very real need to be responsive to short-term and occasional disruptions.
When a child is ill with a flu or cold, and must be kept home from school for a few days, what are parents to do? Take sick leave (unpaid for many ), or request time off (at the discretion of the employer )? Would it not be better for all if there was a prior agreement governing how these eventualities would be managed?
The role of the unions
The reality, as noted by several of those commenting on the derisory Government proposal, is that some workers will have access to this flexibility. Some employers will be pressured into developing these processes by worker unions; some decent managers - particularly in those smaller businesses where they can have greater autonomy over worker conditions - will informally facilitate those who work for them.
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What about the rest? Are workers to be reliant on managerial benevolence? Obviously, workers can improve their own conditions by organising and joining a union, pressuring employers as a group. This would be made easier if we had the sort of rights to collective bargaining, and union recognition, that Labour and others have been pushing for - Sen Sherlock, a former union official with SIPTU, has been particularly vocal on these issues.
Improvements to WFH Bill
Unions can help raise the ceiling of expectations and standards, but laws and regulations set the floor. The current proposal would be much improved with just a number of changes.
Recognise that, in addition to long-term switches in work patterns, workers need occasional and episodic flexibility, and require that employers have policies in place outlining how workers will be facilitated.
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Place a requirement for reasonable accommodation on employers. Building on the requirement in the Employment Equality Acts that employers undertake appropriate measures to facilitate the inclusion of individuals with disabilities, and require employers to build such policies into their management structures.
Provide a meaningful right to appeal, including requiring that employers be able to demonstrate that an adverse decision has actually been made on reasonable grounds.
Speed up the process for considering a request - particularly for episodic or occasional flexibility - in order to ensure it can be a useful tool to support parents and workers in responding to changing needs.
Sick pay
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Finally, it is outrageous that the Government has continued to delay the introduction of promised sick pay legislation. Labour brought forward a bill in 2020 that would have provided sick pay for all. The Government blocked it, supposedly to take six months to consult and draft a new proposal. While it has announced plans for legislation, it has not yet been introduced.
As with flexible working conditions, it makes little sense that issues which came into stark relief when emergency legislation had to be introduced in early 2020, would continue to exist as that emergency legislation lapses.
The Government proposals, which require that workers have GP certification for any period of sick leave, are deeply flawed in the impact they will have on low-paid workers. Take someone on minimum wage, €10.50 for those 20 and older, as low as €7.35 for someone under 18. According to Government proposals, they would be entitled to sick pay at 70 per cent - €58.80 for an eight hour day, or €41.16 for a minor. A GP visit will cost more than the pay received.
Be it a universal entitlement to sick pay, a right to flexible working conditions, or the linking of social insurance payments to previous rates of pay, we need to make sure the lessons of the pandemic - and the opportunities to fashion a New Deal for workers - are not lost.
