Fórsa’s president has criticised the Government’s approach to giving workers the right to request remote or blended working. Speaking at the union’s national conference in Killarney last week, Michael Smyth said legislation drafted in January effectively gave employers a ‘right to refuse’ remote work, rather than giving workers a right to request it.

Mr Smyth said the long list of ‘reasons to refuse’ in the draft law revealed a Government “prepared to pander to every employer sensitivity and stereotype, no matter how baseless, falling back on old and outmoded ways of thinking about the relationship between employers and workers.”

He accused the Government of “simply looked to return to old and outmoded ways of thinking,” instead of “looking forward and harvesting the benefits we now know remote working can deliver.” He described the Government’s efforts as “a spectacular own goal after two years of a revolutionary real-world experience.”

Michael also said that blended working would help Ireland deliver on climate action.

“Why would we mindlessly return to clogging the roads between commuter towns and cities with thousands of private cars, needlessly burning hundreds of thousands of litres of fossil fuel and releasing thousands of tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere so that people can perform work could just as easily be done at home,” he asked.

The union’s communications chief, Bernard Harbor, said Fórsa was campaigning with other unions to strengthen the proposed legislation. “Of course, we accept that some work functions could not be performed on a remote basis. But the legislation should not allow employers to refuse flexible work arrangements on spurious grounds.

“We expect the Government – as an employer and as a legislator – to support the consistent application of guidelines for identifying functions that can be performed remotely, and for facilitating staff requests for home-working arrangements unless there is a genuine reason to refuse,” he said.

The conference passed a motion calling for extended remote work, with fair and transparent procedures for application and strong support and protections for those who work remotely.

The head of Fórsa’s civil service division, Derek Mullen, said the recent achievement of a civil service framework agreement on blended work was an important piece of work.

“While the framework does not guarantee blended work arrangements for all who apply, workers will be able to have the decision reviewed if they are turned down, with a view to resolving the issues that led to the refusal to facilitate remote work,” he said.

Separately, new research from the European Commission has credited the shift to remote working with a record number of women participating in the Irish labour force. It found that the female participation rate jumped from 67% to 72% over the course of the pandemic. This is well above the EU average.