Forum Brief: 24-7 society

Ministers must do more to protect working parents from the need to work anti-social hours during evenings and weekends to service the needs of the 24-7 society, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said in a report published on Wednesday.

Forum Response: Joseph Rowntree Foundation

Ann Mooney, the report co-author, said: "The overriding requirement is to consider the needs of children and to help parents balance their family responsibilities with the requirements of paid work.

"We need policies for atypical hours childcare services, but we also need to consider how employment policies and working hours should be made more 'family friendly' so that parents have less need for care at these times."

Forum Response: Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development

Dianah Worman, spokeswoman for CIPD, told ePolitix.com: "While we welcome the JRF report, we believe that flexible working can play a huge role in addressing this problem to enable parents to juggle work and family responsibilities more successfully.

"The will from employers undoubtedly exists in the form of formal flexible working options, but there remains a stumbling block within organisations.

"We know for instance that almost half of all organisations allow their employees to work from home but only a minority of workers take up this offer (14 per cent).

"Re-educating senior and line managers about the benefits of flexible working is therefore needed."

Forum Response: Institute of Directors

Ruth Lea, head of policy at the IoD, told ePolitix.com: "Everyone should be able to balance their work lives and home and family lives satisfactorily.

"British employers know this and are some of the most flexible in the world. But, flexible though the British employer is, there are clearly limits to the flexibility of working practices an employer can accommodate and employees should recognise this."