Employers Consider Home Working To Save Vehicle Costs

Tuesday, 10. February 2009

In an effort to reduce car usage, the Government and indeed all parties led by the Greens tried to encourage more people to work from home. Whilst there was a small increase at the time latest statistics show that the number of employees working from home has stalled since 2002. Just 3% of workers work from home although 7% do so at least once a week. These results were recently reported in the 2008 National Centre for Social Research Omnibus Survey and the National Travel Survey. Despite various initiatives to reduce congestion and emissions the figures have remained virtually unchanged. Almost 80% of workers said they couldn’t work from home for various reasons including the need to be in the office and of course the type of work they do. However, almost two thirds of occasional home workers said they could do all or more of their work from home. And 13% of those who did not work from home at all said they could do at least some of their work from home. Maybe with the current economic climate this is a subject that should be re-visited? By Graham Hill