Will teleworking become the norm in France again?

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Tetsu Joko / AP / SIPA

We hope you have enjoyed your office chair during the summer, as telecommuting and the back pain that follows may well become the norm again.

In any case, the government invited this Monday to telework "as much as possible" in the zones of heightened and maximum alert, bringing an additional argument to the unions which demand a binding agreement on the subject, while the employers are opposed to it.

"Many workstations allow remote work and rotations can be organized in order to limit the impact on the work collective", explained the Minister of Labor, Elisabeth Borne, during a meeting with the unions and employers, calling for recourse "as much as possible" to teleworking in these areas, including Paris and the inner suburbs.

26% of Ile-de-France clusters in the professional environment

The night before, Matignon had wanted teleworking to be “more than ever” privileged in view of the increasing number of cases of contamination.

Aurélien Rousseau, director general of the regional health agency of Ile-de-France, announced Monday that 203 sources of contamination were active in the Paris region: “A little less than 40% in schools and universities, 26% in the professional environment and 10% in private gatherings ”.

The sanitary protocol does not change.

Trade unions and employers consider it unnecessary to do so.

"No particular formalism"

Updated on September 17, this text indicates that "teleworking remains a recommended mode of organization", in particular to "limit the number of people on public transport".

"Taking into account the current situation with a continuous circulation of the virus, the implementation of teleworking can be considered as an adaptation of the workstation made necessary to allow the continuity of the activity of the company and to guarantee the protection of employees, ”he adds.

For this reason, its implementation “does not require any particular formalism”.

Will the telecommuting cycle restart?

However, the text says that "no provision" can require the employer to respond to a request for teleworking, but "if the position is eligible for telework, the employer must justify its refusal".

If this form of work was massively developed during confinement, with only a quarter of employees working on site in March, the trend has changed significantly with deconfinement: since July one in ten employees continued their activity remotely.

Since September, "companies have tended to bring employees back to the site", says Eric Chevée, responsible for teleworking at CPME.

This trend was "slowed down from October because of the progression of the disease", he tempers.

Government statements since Sunday will "restart a cycle of encouragement for teleworking," said Cyril Chabanier, president of the CFTC.

What costs?

While negotiations for a national inter-professional agreement (Ani) should start on November 3, the unions regret that the employers have dragged their feet since the spring to agree to open these discussions.

"There may be reluctance to resume teleworking because many questions asked during the confinement have remained unanswered.

Negotiations could have answered it, ”said Jérôme Vivenza, Confederal Secretary at the CGT.

Among the topics on the negotiating table, the unions want to address the workload, the assumption of costs directly related to telework and disconnection, data protection, the issue of childcare when classes are closed. , vulnerable people, gender equality, etc.

And the Medef intervened

Not sure that the negotiation will lead to a consensus, because Medef has warned that it wished the text to be "neither normative", "nor prescriptive", to the chagrin of the unions.

"We are not on the idea of ​​modifying the regulatory corpus", confirms Eric Chevée, stressing that since January, nearly 600 agreements on teleworking have been signed, providing in particular two to three days of teleworking per week.

“We've been asking for an Ani for months.

The government must put pressure on the employers for a rapid normative agreement, while we are perhaps heading again towards a generalization of telework, ”replied Cyril Chabanier.

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  • Coronavirus

  • Covid 19

  • Economy

  • Teleworking

  • Union