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The rapid increase
in working from home seems to have caught policy makers on the
hop. It is not just the increase in numbers, it is the changing
nature of what people do when they work at home that has left
the legislators behind. Traditionally, policies affecting home
working have been underpinned by two assumptions:
-
that home
working is usually manual, exploitative and underpaid
-
that work in
general is for the most part too noisy, smelly and traffic
generating to be acceptable in residential areas.
The rise of the new
economy and new ways of working means that these prejudices need
to be put aside. It is not the case that specific legislation or
regulation has been developed over the years to deal directly
with working at home.
Home working is,
however, affected by wider legislation. And generally this wider
legislation has created disincentives, grey areas, red tape -
not to mention red herrings - that effectively put obstacles in
the way of home based enterprise and employment.
Barriers to
tackle
This ought to
change, in the view of a new report from the Joseph Rowntree
Foundation. The Foundation (JRF) has a strong track record in
promoting social justice and in particular the improvement of
living conditions. Their concept of "lifetime homes"
is well known, as is their commitment to social housing and
economic initiatives to lift people out of poverty. It is
natural, then, that they should turn their attention to the
issue of combining work with living space.
The report Living
at Work: a new policy framework for modern home workers
examines the areas where new policy needs to be developed to
sweep away obstacles to home working:
-
Taxation
-
Rateable
value
-
Planning
-
Social
housing
-
Regeneration
A key principle
underlying many of the recommendations in these areas is that
new forms of home working - teleworking - create positive
opportunities for people to improve their standard of living.
And yet public policies put obstacles in the way.
Sometimes the
disincentives are more apparent than real. These come in the
forms of grey areas, mainly in the field of taxation, business
rates and planning regulations. Rarely invoked powers create
amongst teleworkers and would-be teleworkers the fear that they
may be penalised for working from home, or even prevented from
doing it. But for the most part the authorities do not take
action.
De-regulate -
don't regulate!
It is often argued
by proponents of teleworking that there should be particular
legislation encouraging and protecting home working. This is a
dangerous route to follow, and would lead to the creation of a
tangle of red tape. The bureaucratic mind loves to regulate by
making fine distinctions, creating classes of people and
activities, adding copious "if"s, "but"s and
"notwithstanding"s. Far better to remove areas of
bureaucratic activity than add to it.
What is needed is a
simple principle:
The effects of such
a principle would be in effect de-regulatory, and simple to
administer. The report argues that allowing what is widely
undertaken on the quiet would be pretty much revenue neutral for
the taxman. But importantly, it would remove disincentives to
honest people.
Planning
A somewhat odd
situation exists at present with regard to planning law. On the
one hand, government departments officially encourage
teleworking. But on a practical basis, they discourage it.
Existing planning
regulations which prevent home-based businesses are largely
rooted in the view that workplaces and homes make bad neighbours.
There has been a gradual move towards the concept of "mixed
development", but in practice a pretty rigid divide is
drawn between residences and workplaces.
Rules affecting
"live/work space" can be highly restrictive.
Traditionally the type of case coming before a planning
committee or enforcement officer is one where a home-based
business use such as physiotherapy or car repair has expanded to
the extent that it causes a nuisance to neighbours - due to
noise, smells or too many clients visiting. These types of
nuisance are likely to be far less common with
teleworking.
At a strategic level
too there is an absence of awareness about teleworking. South
Cambridgeshire was one of the first local authorities to write
into their development plan policies supportive of teleworking.
Some others have followed, but few have any real idea about how
to put flesh on the bones of generic support. Government
planning advice supports "mixed use" development, and
encourages home working as a means of reducing the need to
travel.
"Mixed
use" in planning terms means locating different uses - e.g.
commercial and residential - close to each other, rather than
separating them through a zoning policy. The JRF report explores
the implications of this in terms of locating work and living in
the same location. While this is developing on an informal
basis, there are relatively few examples of "live-work
space" being actively planned.
Housing
All this of course
has great implications for house design and housing policies.
With the (apparent) need for over 3 million new houses, mostly
in the south of England, to accommodate the increasing number of
households in the next decade, there has been a vogue in
planning and urban design circles for "densification".
An assumption is that as there will be more smaller households
less space is required per dwelling. But this is not necessarily
the case.
With the rise of
home working and increasing numbers of people looking after
elderly relatives there is a growing need for flexible
space in homes. People also need adequate space for
children to play or study in, adults to work or manage their
domestic affairs, or to care for dependents. At different stages
of life additional space may be needed for different uses.
This is particularly
relevant in public policy terms when considering social housing.
All too frequently when new developments are planned private
housing includes plenty of space, while social housing (perhaps
included as a result of "planning gain") is developed
on the basis of getting as many units as possible in the
available space. In this way social exclusion can be built into
new developments - excluding people in social housing from being
able to work from home.
In addition to the
issues relating to new build, most local councils and housing
societies allocate homes to people on a basis that does not
include their need to work from home or their potential to do
so.
The
downside
There are often
perceptions that with home working comes increased risk of
social isolation, isolation from the workplace and management,
the risk of exploitation and the transfer of corporate costs
onto the household. The report takes these into account, raising
the issues and suggesting policy direction for employers and for
public policy.
Starting point
for policy development
There are many
social issues arising from the rise of new forms of work based
at home, and the JRF report makes an excellent starting point
for exploring them. In the coming months and years we can expect
some serious research and many new policy initiatives.
However, the
temptation must be resisted to add to the existing body of
regulations. In many cases, it is too much regulation and red
tape that is the problem - a clear out is needed. The focus must
be on clearing the way for new enterprises and initiatives to
prosper.
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