Summary: COVID-19 has induced changes in working patterns at a pace which has no parallel in modern history. These changes have been for the most part undertaken voluntarily and financed by the private sector to ensure continuity of business. The state could encourage and support this transition as it is likely to be necessary in the coming years. Equally the state should provide support to mitigate any potential downsides in such an approach. This essay lays out what such a future could look like, the benefits of doing so and the necessity of state support and the likely interventions which would be required to support such a transition.
COVID-19 has produced a profound shock beyond anything which has been witnessed in the UK outside of war. Enough superlatives have been employed to capture the scale of the situation, but we will focus on the profound changes in working patterns we have witnessed since March 2020. Although the necessity of enforced working from home as a response to the Coronavirus is clear on medical grounds; reducing unnecessary person to person contact in offices and workplaces, as well as reduced reliance on typically overcrowded public transport during the morning and evening rush. Almost immediately benefits were noticed, with anecdotal discussion of increased work-life balance and there could be longer-term benefits from a government backed remote working policy for everyone in the UK.
The current legal requirement is that the UK should be a net zero emitter of carbon by 2050. To get there will require huge changes in the way UK economic life is conducted, which will be expensive and potentially highly disruptive to peoples lives and livelihoods. These will include changes in working patterns (less flying for business trips, fewer car journeys) which could be made easier by transitioning to remote working now, rather than at some future date. Changing commuting patterns would have clear economic benefits as well as environmental ones, much of the value of HS2 (somewhat higher than £100billion as of writing) has been made contingent on additional capacity it would free up in the entire network. If ministers in 2015 (the time when the HS2 bill was originally laid out) had been offered a policy which could immediately free up a large chunk of capacity on the rail network, without laying a single extra mile of track or buying another carriage, there is little doubt in how they would have responded. Even a small change in remote working patterns (much less than what is envisioned in this essay) could radically reduce the pressure on the network.
The final benefit we can point towards is the levelling effect that working remotely could have for the UKs regions. Currently many areas of the UK experience “brain drain” as their young people head towards the UKs universities and then almost inevitably end up in one of the major cities (of which London receives a disproportionate share). This leads to multiple problems, some of which are self-reinforcing; lower wages in the regions (compare the median weekly wage in London of £716 to that of £524 in the North East). Remote working instantly levels this playing field, allowing in the long run, individuals and businesses to locate wherever in the UK makes the most sense for them. To capitalise on this opportunity (and deal with the issues such long term changes would create), the government should provide some benefit to UK employers for employing individuals in the UK but having them work at least partially remotely; given the economic incentives on businesses and individuals (reduced office costs and commuting costs, respectively) these need not be large to encourage firms to continue remote work for their employees. Employing individuals in the UK would become more attractive (not less attractive as detractors of working remotely have suggested) due to reduced overhead costs.
The state could provide guidance to the private sector; many in the Civil Service are working remotely and effectively currently, and this policy should be extended. Simultaneously encouraging firms to hire employees remotely in areas suffering from unemployment could help deal with post COVID-19 increases in unemployment in certain areas of the UK. To encourage more remote working the government could require train companies (through their operating contract) to offer season tickets which are not built around commuting every weekday. With digital tickets passengers could pay for tickets which allow so many journeys a year, which would allow remote employees the flexibility to travel to the workplace when required. The final piece to enable remote working would be to commit to providing full fibre broadband to every home in the UK as soon as practicable. Under any situation where more remote working is likely to be required regions which are left as “broadband blackholes” will be further disadvantaged. Given the speed that this rollout would be required and the maintenance of such a UK wide network, more jobs would be created in every region of the UK, helping to reduce the economic impact on jobs which are reliant on current commuting patterns.
City Centre regions are envisioned to be the most impacted areas of the UK, practical ghost towns since the first UK wide lockdown. These are the areas which would require the most support, which could take multiple guises. Support could be provided to help move those working in city centre areas to new jobs likely to be created in areas closer to where people live. In time areas which are currently used primarily for office space and similar could be repurposed and rezoned as mixed use residential areas, helping alleviate the overall housing shortage in the UK.
Given that large changes in peoples lives are going to be required to satisfy environmental legislation which is already in law, without thinking of further changes likely to be made over the coming years as the crisis moves from COVID-19 to Climate, taking steps now whilst peoples lives are already disrupted can be an economically advantageous and environmentally sound policy.
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