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HR practiceLettersWork-life balance

If most firms already allow flexible work why add laws?

by Personnel Today 17 Mar 2008
by Personnel Today 17 Mar 2008

With regard to your story ‘CIPD dismay over government caution on right to request flexible working‘ (Personneltoday.com, 22 February), am I missing something here?

If nine out of 10 employers are already willing to consider changes to working patterns from any employee, then why is additional legislation needed? If the statistic is correct, then clearly an unregulated consensual reality exists within the majority of organisations.

I am concerned about the prospect of extending the right to request flexible working further, and the impact this would inevitably have on productivity where a full‑time post can become a part-time one.

In my experience flexible working requests invariably involve a request to work part‑time (ie, fewer hours).

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I remain to be convinced that this does not place an additional burden on an employer, as Sally Low points out. Why force legislation on the 10% of employers who do not necessarily believe there is a firm commercial case for flexible working?

Marcus Atkins
Personnel director,
Trailfinders

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

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Personnel Today
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