Procicat endorses the gradual return to in-person work
The Government urges the promotion of working from home when possible, but the obligation to limit labour mobility falls
BarcelonaProcicat has approved this Friday a new resolution that will come into force on Monday and that recommends both public and private companies to adopt measures to progressively return to in-person work. Even so, it also urges them to promote teleworking whenever possible. The obligation to limit job mobility will therefore fall. The Health minister, Josep Maria Argimon, had already advanced this measure early in an interview to RAC1 and explained the intention of the Catalan government "to fix" teleworking. Thus, the Procicat has agreed to extend the bulk of the containment measures against covid-19 in its new resolution at least until 12 July, before the rise in the number of contagions in recent weeks, especially among young people.
The endorsement of the return to work will also affect from Monday on workers in the Generalitat administration. As discussed at a meeting with the unions of the Civil Service, they will gradually return to presentiality until September. The proposal of the Government is that public workers can do two days of working from home and three in person. The Administration and Public Function secretariat will issue an instruction to regulate the new organizational measures and prevention and security, so as to allow the return to presential work places, but maintaining, at the same time, remote work.
Despite the start of the vaccination campaign, working from home has resisted during the last half year as a modality already consolidated in many companies. According to data from the National Observatory of Technology and Society, which depends on the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, during the first quarter of 2021 in Catalonia 15% of employees continued to do their work from home. It is the second autonomous community where more people work remotely, after Madrid, with 21%, and is above the Spanish average of 11%. In absolute figures, in the State 2,146,000 people between January and March opted for this formula, coinciding with the spike in covid cases earlier this year and the measures restricting social interaction that were imposed.
