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NEW tax and spending arrangements to facilitate teleworking will be part of a new government strategy to be released next month, Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said today.
As part of a debate on a bill on the issue tabled by the Labor Party, Varadkar said the government wants remote work, home work and combined work to become part of the new normal based primarily on the chose.
“Done right, the benefits will be significant in reduced business costs, better work-life balance, more balanced regional development, less traffic, fewer greenhouse gas emissions, and the time saved on the journey will be used to a better purpose, ”he said.
However, Varadkar noted that surveys indicate that around 10% to 20% of employees are eager to get back to the office as soon as possible.
Another 10-20% would like to work from home permanently, he said, while most employees want to work in combination, some days at the office and some days at home or some days in a remote center.
“That is what we should try to facilitate,” he said.
A remote work strategy will be published before the end of the year, he said.
It will include proposals for a network of digital centers to be built across the country, tax and spending arrangements to facilitate remote work “to ensure that the cost is fairly borne and the benefits are shared,” and the right to request remote work.
There will also be proposals on the right to disconnect, and support for companies to make the digital transition.
Burnout
We all know that the excessive use of telephones and digital devices has been linked to everything from stress, exhaustion, insomnia, as well as the tense personal relationships of that device that is always on and never more than a few feet away , buzzing, blinking and beeping.
“This is an experience that we are all familiar with given the jobs we do. Many people admit that they are glued to their phones and laptops late into the night. This phenomenon predates the pandemic and the progressive intrusion of electronic communications well beyond the normal working day, even at lunchtime, it is not just remote work, nor is it new, ”he said.
While he said flexible working and remote working have clear advantages, a long-recognized potential disadvantage is the expectation that “we are always connected, always contactable and always available. This is not how it should be ”.
Varadkar said a reduction in the intrusion of work-related digital devices after working hours is needed to balance the professional and personal lives of workers.
He said Ireland also has a full body of labor legislation including the Working Time Organization Act 1997, which already sets maximum working time and minimum rest periods for employees, setting out obligations for employers to ensure that Your employees take regular breaks and don’t work too long.
Right to disconnect
He said his office is examining the law in the context of the right to disconnect to consider deficiencies in the law.
A revision of the law to give workers the right to disconnect, which gives workers the legal ability to avoid work emails after hours, began under former Business Minister, now Social Protection Heather Humphreys.
The initiative was introduced in France in 2017 and required companies with more than 50 employees to develop a charter defining the right of employees to disconnect and establishing the hours when staff are not supposed to send or reply to emails. .
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Italy, Spain and Belgium have also implemented such legislation.
Tyranny
Speaking on the subject today, Labor’s Brendan Howlin said that we always believed that technology would come to liberate workers and that technology would reach a point where we could all have infinite leisure.
“The opposite is true. A new tyranny is often imposed by the ability to constantly contact employees and the expectation of bosses that one will respond at any moment. That cannot be allowed to continue.
He said that some large tech companies have no one on a fixed work schedule, stating that some are “constant slaves” because everyone is permanently connected and connected.
“Not only was his work monitored at all times, but he was compared with all the workers of that company around the world. They didn’t even know if they were doing it right or not. We have to face that kind of tyranny now, ”he said.
The Labor’s Working from Home (Covid-19) bill requires employers to inform employees about their policy on after-hours communications and protects employees from punishment for not responding to communications.
The bill also requires the employer to pay employees for the proper work equipment and pay them for the costs of working from home, including the costs of additional utilities, such as electricity, heat and broadband.
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