“Are they not aware that when youths leave school now they’re never going to go and work in their life, because the culture is, ‘Well my mum or dad work from home that’s what I’ll do’?”
I don’t have children, but after four long weeks in my company even Dora, the dachshund, was beginning to stare at me with thinly veiled contempt.
I went back to the office.
Charlie, who started as an apprentice at the age of 15, would not be a multi-millionaire had he tried to fix blocked drains from his kitchen.
My parents set up and ran their own catering company.
Every morning, without fail, my insomniac dad would rise at 5am and be at work an hour later.
He got home to the opening strains of the Coronation Street theme — and supper on the table — at 7.30pm.
Their work ethic ensured I didn’t slack when it came to GCSEs, A levels or my degree.
As a cub showbiz reporter I thought nothing of staying out until 3am, and being at my desk at 10am sharp the next day.
It’s just what you did if you wanted to be a Fleet Street journalist.
SWAN IN
Nowadays, many graduates believe it is their God-given right to swan into the office on their own terms.
They would last about a minute in showbiz.
Entitled Gen Z’ers are angrily gunning for employers who won’t let them have their “work-life balance”.
For kids growing up now, what sort of example is this?
Get stressed, take a month off.
Of course, with people suffering from real and genuine mental health issues, it’s imperative they seek, and get, help.
But there is a creeping generation of entitled workers thinking it is their right to lay down terms of their employment.
If we keep going soft on workers, eventually we will become soft as a society — capitulating at the first whiff of difficulty.
UNHEALTHY
It emerged this month that Britons were left at the mercy of the Taliban in Afghanistan because civil servants working from home could not access vital documents.
Without face-to-face interaction, mistakes get made. The germ of great ideas does not get sparked.
Take the Queen.
Aged 95, she’s just completed a gruelling schedule of 120 official engagements in 194 days.
That’s 120 days she’s been on the ground, proffering a gloved hand or gamely feigning interest in Buckingham Palace garden parties since the death of her beloved husband, Prince Philip.
Despite her recent hospital stay, on Monday she will be in Glasgow for the first day of the COP26 climate change conference.
I’m sure she’s had better Mondays.
Not once has she said she can’t be a***d, and asked to Zoom in from her four-poster.
I’m all for a bit of flexibility and employers offering a split office/home week to staff.
Work shouldn’t be slave labour.
But a permanent shift to five days a week from the sofa isn’t healthy — mentally or physically.