3. Unequal access to homeworking
[ch 3: page 20]Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, homeworking was becoming more widely available, thanks largely to advances in technology. However, expansion was too slow to meet demand. According to the TUC, in 2019 there were 274,000 more employees working from home compared to 10 years previously. But the union body estimated that up to four million UK workers wanted the option to homework but hadn’t been given the chance.
When the pandemic hit the UK, an unprecedented number of people were sent home to work. Nearly 40% of people in employment worked entirely from home in April 2020 and the numbers homeworking have remained high throughout the pandemic.
The homeworking revolution of 2020 and 2021 has shown clearly that employers can no longer insist that all their workers have to be on-site every day to do their job well.