On working people’s rights in teleworking – Article by Ioanna Fikardou – AKEL parliamentary assistant

 

12 October 2022, “Haravgi” newspaper

Since the start of the pandemic, more than a third of working people across the EU now work from home. Teleworking, apart from the positive aspects it brings, introduces new facts into labour relations and imposes new obligations between employers and employees, often to the detriment of working people.

Increasing teleworking has led to an imposed culture of constant connection and continuous operation and can have a horizontal negative impact on working people’s fundamental rights, fair employment conditions and work-life balance, physical and mental health and, given its disproportionate impact on workers with caring responsibilities, who are in general women, on equality between men and women.

The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) published a report before the pandemic broke out in 2019 revealing that 27% of respondents who work at home said that they were forced to work in their spare time to meet their work demands.

In January, the European Parliament adopted a resolution calling on the European Commission to table a legislative proposal to establish the right to unplug. This right has become more pressing during this period because of the increase in teleworking that has arisen in the wake of the Covid pandemic. In essence, however, teleworking together with other flexible forms of work is something that emerged several years ago and is (also) rooted in digital development. At the same time teleworking has in fact been a “desire” of employers for some time and the pandemic has played a catalytic role. France implemented a similar law in 2017.

In the European Parliament’s resolution, teleworking is presented as a necessity stemming from the pandemic and that because of it, the worker was forced to change his/her way of working and turn his/her home into a workplace. Since the outbreak of the pandemic and the implementation of the measures, more than one third of working people have been teleworking (before the pandemic the figure was approximately 5%).

Concerned about the consequences for working people, we as AKEL took the initiative and discussed the issue at two sessions of the Parliamentary Labour Affairs Committee. During the debate, it became clear that it is now imperative to adopt a legislative framework which will regulate and safeguard the rights of working people and employers.

The competent Ministry is already discussing the legislative framework which will regulate the right or obligation of the employer to proceed with the way in which work or services are carried out through teleworking, but also the rights of the employer, such as the hours of work, the means to be used and the way in which teleworking is to be monitored.

Teleworking and working people’s rights must be regulated by legislation as soon as possible. Cyprus is one of the few countries that has not yet made any progress in this area.