Mistaking Uniformity For "Fairness and Equity"

[dewline]

I have concerns(!) about the choice of phrasing in Treasury Board President Mona Fortier's arguments for a hybrid work model for those branches of the federal civil service that her branch of the federal cabinet has jurisdiction over.

Also, doubling down on "right of the employer" rhetoric is not helpful.

The civil service needs sufficiently safe workspaces to return to and, for those who do not or cannot drive, a sufficiently safe public transit system to use to get there. I'm not seeing that here. OC Transpo and STO must be allowed to return to "mask up!" rules for everyone who can medically manage it or this isn't going to do what the current government is hoping for. And the same requirement exists for public transit in any city that has such services and a federal civil service presence.

Without at least the mask rules back in place, we won't have safe federal workspaces. We'll have superspreader sites. Again.

https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/treasury-board-president-calls-return-to-office-plan-right-of-employer

(Yes, there's other arguments to be made for efficiencies, pollution/ecological considerations, savings on government expenditures, etc.. Other people are making those arguments.)

Comments

[sabotabby]

I would make one (1) big change to the way we are currently doing work.

Employers are responsible for providing a salary and compensation money to anyone who contracts covid on the job and is unable to work. For life. If the employee is permanently disabled, they should continue to be compensated at the salary level, with benefits, as if they were working. They should also get money to compensate them for loss of quality of life and any mobility devices, medications, etc. that they need. If it's unclear how the employee contracted covid, the burden of proof should be on the employer to prove that they had a safe workplace and commuting policy.

I bet things would change real quick.

[warriorsavant]

Love your icon.

[sabotabby]

dewline made it.

[dewline]

That would, I suspect, be a good change to make. Whether the unintended consequences would be to our liking might be another matter.

[warriorsavant]

Employers (gov't or private), just can't wrap their heads around the idea that people can do much work at home, as good, or better, than having to commute to an office. Just bothers their little control freak managerial minds.

[dewline]

Some are better able to understand this than others. Neither government nor private sectors are monolithic in their thinking here. There are pressures being applied to coerce uniformity of the pre-Pandemic sort, of course...