‘A waste of time’: Public servants prepare to work three days in office

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The start date of the government’s updated remote work mandate is just around the corner and public servants aren’t happy.

Starting Sept. 9, all staff employed under the Treasury Board and some in other departments and agencies, are expected to work on-site three days a week. For executives, the expectation is that they work in the office four days a week.

Several unions have contested the decision since it was announced in early May, holding rallies, filing complaints, encouraging members to submit grievances, sending open letters and launching petitions.

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They’ve questioned the government’s motivation behind the decision and have stated that it was made without consultation and was unsupported by evidence. Unions have also said they’ve heard from members who are concerned about how their increased office presence will impact their finances and work-life balance.

Amine El Maache, an employee with the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, said he’s frustrated about the update, especially given that the government hasn’t provided much rationale.

Deputy clerk of the Privy Council Christiane Fox has said that having staff work together onsite “strengthens collaboration within, and across teams and, increases opportunities for learning and sharing.”

“I don’t see how going from three days a week to two days a week improves those benefits,” said El Maache, who noted that he’s not necessarily against going into the office, so long as it’s for a purpose. “I think there’s so many more benefits in working remotely that outweigh the benefits of working from the office.”

El Maache marched alongside dozens of other employees at a rally in downtown Ottawa Thursday afternoon to express his opposition to the new policy. He said he’d much prefer to work on-site one or two days a week, adding that his bus commute from Aylmer to downtown Ottawa takes more than an hour on a heavy-traffic day.

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“When you’re working from home, you have more of a work-life balance,” El Maache said, adding that non-public servants would also benefit from having less traffic and that, on a long-term basis, taxpayers would benefit if the government reduced its office footprint. “I think honestly, it’s going to drain a lot of people’s energy to go back to the office. People are not going to be productive.”

Alexandre Demers, a federal programmer, said he’s unhappy about having to work on-site more often. Previously, IT employees were exempted from the government’s remote work mandate but, under the new rules, that exemption no longer exists.

With full implementation for IT workers only expected by September 2025, Demers will start working in the office once a week in September, with that number increasing to two days in January and three days in April.

“I don’t like it because I’m a programmer, my job is on the computer,” Demers said at the rally, organized by the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada. “I don’t need to move to a different place to do the same work I would do on the computer at the office. It’s ridiculous.”

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Demers, who said he’d also like to see proof about productivity levels and how the change will increase collaboration, said he’s also not looking forward to his hour-long commute from Gatineau.

“It wastes my time,” said Demers. “We made a step forward with remote work and now we’re taking a step back. I’m betting the next step is four days or five days a week.”

Matthew Deline said that when he’s in the office, he spends all day on video calls.

“During COVID, my group demonstrated that they could do all the work that they needed to do at home, so going into the office to work on Teams just doesn’t make any sense to me,” Deline said, adding that he reverse-commutes from his home in central Ottawa to the suburbs, which is “not great.”

Longtime public servant Shohreh Khajavi said the government’s decision “makes zero sense.”

“I don’t want to, because in this case I have to pay for high-speed internet at home and now I have to come here,” said the Shared Services Canada employee while at a union rally for remote work on Sept. 5.

Khajavi said she’s concerned not only about the money she’ll have to spend on parking, which costs $25 a day, but about the extra gas she’ll use to make her way to her downtown office from Nepean. She said she’s also not looking forward to the time she’ll spend in traffic.

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Planning for next week, Khajavi said she has been unable to book desk space in her office using the government’s system. An ongoing issue, Khajavi said she went to work late last month without having been able to secure a space and sat in the office’s lobby at the beginning of her workday before snagging a desk from someone who didn’t show up.

“The whole thing is a waste of time, a waste of money, waste of taxpayers’ money,” Khajavi said. “It’s just stupid.”

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