, believes BEIS failed to frame flexible working as a universal right from the start. “Of the organizations invited to give evidence, all campaign for mothers’ or parents’ rights, which is such a singular view of who would benefit,” she explains. “The language of the survey is a fudge too—it asks why flexible working is important and immediately defaults to asking the respondent to set out caring commitments and reference any disability or condition you may have.
One in seven people looking for a job with flexible working is from the LGBTQ community, one in 10 has a disability, and 48 percent are Black, Asian, or other ethnic minority. Hamilton recalls the sharp intake of breath when she laid out this data at the roundtable with MPs. “They wanted the consultation to remain a parent thing, and yet there’s a whole different narrative that needs addressing,” she explains.
There’s a jaded sense among campaigning organizations that this is the last chance to voice flexible-work ideals in the UK for up to five years. Even ifis brought forward to 2022, the onus will remain on businesses and employees to navigate the future of flexible working without government support. The consultation has failed to deliver the most basic of frameworks, and in doing so, has killed any hope of the UK becoming a flexible-working utopia.
The decision doesn’t surprise Hamilton, because it’s inextricably linked with the fear of a new taxation system. “If the government genuinely pushed flexible working, businesses would need to move to more variable organizational cost structures, and more workers could move away from PAYE [pay-as-you-earn] taxes to being contractors,” she says. “It would shaft how they fund everything and impact the wealthy who use capital gains so effectively.
Employees at companies with an increasingly hybrid labor force are seeing the benefits of outcome-based work culture—including, they hope, less risk of burnout. “Workers would be much better off, as they would work to an outcome, enabling them to do the same job for several different companies,” says Hamilton. And although wholesale adoption of outcome-based working runs the risk of repeating many of the problems of the gig economy, earning potential could skyrocket.
WiredUK UK MPs are stuck in the past - 'work in office' is the only thing they understand - so laws will naturally be outdated as the MPs are outdated.
WiredUK Not knowing which way to turn next, having never planned for worst case scenario in UK, our leaders are now at the mercy of commercial and vested pecuniary interests, plus offshore domination. It's now a case of wheels within wheels; customary favour culture the sticky lubricant.
WiredUK Moan moan moan!
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