Office staff in England are being encouraged by ministers to return to work where possible to prevent permanent economic damage in city centres around the country.
Yet the advice has wreaked confusion because the official government guidance — which is for people to work from home if possible — has not changed.
On Monday morning a Downing Street spokesman said: “If you can go back, provided your company has obeyed the guidelines, provided it is safe, then you should go back to work.”
He indicated that the suggestion would also apply to tens of thousands of civil servants, who have been ordered to work from home since March.
The comments came after prime minister Boris Johnson on Friday appeared to encourage people to return to work.
Government officials said the changing verbal advice reflected ministers’ fears about the damage to the economy from the majority of workers staying at home. “The prime minister is definitely concerned about the impact of cities and towns and people not being there,” said one.
They added that the absence of workers in city centres was doing huge damage to businesses ranging from sandwich shops to clothing retailers and newsagents.
Number 10 said on Monday that the formal guidance is “under review”, adding: “What the advice says is that employers should decide in consultation with their workers whether it is viable for them to continue working from home.”
The ambiguity has prompted frustration among business groups, which have called for greater clarity.
Carolyn Fairbairn, director-general of the CBI, which represents UK industry, said that whether office workers could return had become a “really fuzzy area”.
She said: “We have no clarity. Michael Gove [the cabinet office minister] hinted at it, Boris Johnson hinted at it . . . Tell us if offices can go back. We need much more clarity.”
Dame Carolyn added: “Regent Street [in central London] has all its shops open and nobody is in them. That’s because offices haven't gone back. If offices continue to stay away we will have very stressed high streets and local communities.”
Ministers have not changed the formal written guidance partly because there are still concerns about the safety of some workplaces — even though Downing Street insists that many offices are now “Covid secure”.
The government also fears that a sudden jump in the numbers returning to work could overwhelm public transport — a challenge that is particularly acute in London.
London Underground says it would struggle to maintain social distancing at over 25 per cent capacity, even with the distance recently reduced from two metres to one metre.
Many workers are telling their employers that they do not want to have to travel on public transport to get to their offices because of health concerns.
One government figure agreed that there was a “potentially confusing” difference between the formal guidance and the new verbal advice but said: “There is a creative ambiguity there, we want more people to come to work but don’t want a complete return to normal yet.”
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Another said the government wanted to leave it to employers and employees to thrash out the best way forward — depending on their circumstances. “The message is go if you think it’s safe but whether it’s safe is up to you the worker, this is open to interpretation.”
Manuel Cortes, general secretary of the TSSA transport union, said: “Sadly we have had mixed messages from this government . . . when people rightly expected and deserved absolute clarity from ministers.”
Last week the Department for Transport removed from its website guidance saying people should avoid public transport to prevent the spread of Covid-19 — although it still says people should work from home if possible.
Meanwhile Mr Johnson on Monday said people in England “should be wearing face coverings inside shops — in line with existing rules for public transport — as he appeared to soften up the public for an imminent change in advice.
With Scotland having already ordered citizens to cover their faces in shops, the prime minister said the government would decide this week whether “tools of enforcement” were needed to get English people to follow suit.
The intervention appeared to contradict cabinet office minister Michael Gove, who on Sunday said that face coverings should not become mandatory in English shops.
Additional reporting by Daniel Thomas
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2020-07-13 16:56:00Z
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