Zero Hours Contracts- The Rise And Rise.

[Technician]

I am not sure what manner of reception this may receive on this forum

but someone sent me an E mail today that made me think.

The current coalition government thinks this is such a wonderful idea

that they wish to see more of it.  There is a very real prospect of people

being employed in this manner (employed!!!!!) and they cannot claim

benefit because they are in possession of a contract. (!!!!).

It is obvious that the current coalition government loves this because it

gets the jobless statistics down.  Well, we all know about lies, damned

lies and statistics.

Here is the hyperlink in all its manifest horror.

https://secure.38degrees.org.uk/sports-direct-zero-hours.

 

[Apache]

So on the one hand we have high unemployment. On this very forum people have had to get rid of staff due to lack of work. Although I appreciate its not ideal as an employee it is crippling to business paying someone to do nothing.

I think it seems quite reasonable. No-one is forcing these guys to take the jobs.

 

[ProDave]

A "zero hour" contract sounds just like a description of self employment.

With the one exception, that as self employed, to some extent I get to choose the hours I work, whereas most zero hour "employees" probably don't have that luxury.

This is nothing new, I first heard of zero hour contracts 20 years ago when I had a proper job, and things were getting shakey where I was working at the time and one of my searches turned up a zero hour contract, which I declined in just the same way I declined short fixed term contracts.

 

[Technician]

Yes, Pro.  Self employment is defined by a choice

of WHERE and WHEN you work, which this is not.

 

[Steve3948]

Well labour got us where we are now, so any improvement is better than nothing  :innocent   :innocent

 

[wozz]

Can't believe that something  which helps employers have a flexible workforce gets such bad press. 

I should imagine if they were banned tomorrow all the good employees would get a proper job on the same hours and all the others would get laid off with no hours. No one is holding a gun to these people's heads to stay on the contact. 

It makes more good 'bad' news, the opposition must love this. Now the news is full of these people moaning, I wasn't given enough notice to work, I didn't get many hours well try another job then! I sympathise with some people's situation but slagging off this is not going to improve things but make them worse. 

 

[Technician]

Zero- hours- contracts may have their place but there is plenty

of evidence that point to the possibility that they are being used

inappropriately.  One of the (possible) abuses as outlined by

Vince Cable is that when agreed, the employee is forbidden by

that contract to find other work when there is none available

with the other party in the contract.  It may be a means to "sift"

the willing new employees from the others with a view to awarding

agreed contracts with agreed minimum hours but at times

the fact that it is a zero-hours-contract is concealed in the wording.

I do take the contributions of others seriously but, like so much

that is happening in the world of work, it can be a can of worms

best left closed.

 

[Jono Pashley]

I see that it could be exploited but from an employers view i can see it being good

Its a shame they dont go a few steps further and have things like if the employee is useless and a waste of time and money then the employer doesnt have to go through hoops and loops to get rid of them and still get taken to a tribuneral due to EU human rights over stress or something similar.

I personally think a lot of employees have it too easy, they dont have a work ethic and couldnt give two hoots once 5pm comes, they turn up late, take extra time for lunch hour and have extra tea breaks and then do all that texting an face twat thing whilst being paid....

Ill stop ranting now  :Salute

PS I didnt sign the petition

Similarly there are plenty of employers who take the piss with what they expect and how they treat people.

 

[Sidewinder]

I didn't think I was that bad Jono!

 

[Nicky Tesla]

Can you imagine wanting to be an electrician, a joiner,  a plumber what ever,  but every job you went for, was now on zero hours contract because it became the norm.

What a nightmare.............would be like being on agency permanently..............every christmas/winter with a month or more off work at least.

NO THANKS.........the retired and those been in the same job for years dont care,  they are safe.

 

[wozz]

or you are a apprentice that has been laid off that just needs a bit more work experience of a couple of jobs to complete your portfolio, anything less than 37 hours just aint worth getting out of bed for! 

;  

 

[Robin Spark]

There was a lad on tv who worked at Sprots direct on a zero hour contract.  He said that up until last christmas he had regular work with them, but then come january/ february he had no work at all.  However to me this is common sense for retailers who have very little revenue coming in after the xmas period.

What i do think is difficult is I have a few friends/ relations who do retail work and they never do the same shifts and their employer needs them to be totally flexible all week/ evenings and weekends. 

This means they cannot find another job elsewhere to boost their working hours as they never know what shifts they will be working! Doesnt sound very organised to me as surely if you have a business you could keep most of the regular staff on fixed shifts and then give overtime or get extra help during busy times???

 

[Steve3948]

I think there are other reasons for it.

They keep the hours low to avoid paying employers national insurance, so it's better to have more staff doing lots of little shifts.

Then by not giving fixed shifts the employee cannot say want say 9am-1pm it's not an option.

Retail is the pits, they want blood out of stone, but my wife lives it, god knows why - cheap clothes maybe

 

[Technician]

It is that blood line of 21 hours per week is it not?

My concern is that most people do NOT read an

employment contract word for word, and the fact

that it is a zero-hours article may be concealed in

the wording.

 

[apprentice87]

Ok, great for those of you who are self employed, but what about everyone else?? How you ever going to get a mortgage or anything if you do not know what your hours and earnings are?? What about people that get "working families tax credit" [something i know absolutely nothing about, have not got any kids] but i understand it is based on how many hours you work. what you going to do if you have no set hours.

Yes, you all just think it is a great idea, will not be long and we will be back to little kids up chimneys and sacking anyone that could write their own name.....

john...

 

[Technician]

John.......It is going that way now......time was when a family had

to put up hard cash so that their son could have an apprenticeship.

That was certainly the case in the time of Chippendale and others.

If you are too old to begin one now, hard cash may be difficult to find.

 

[wozz]

Ok, great for those of you who are self employed, but what about everyone else?? How you ever going to get a mortgage or anything if you do not know what your hours and earnings are?? What about people that get "working families tax credit" [something i know absolutely nothing about, have not got any kids] but i understand it is based on how many hours you work. what you going to do if you have no set hours.

Yes, you all just think it is a great idea, will not be long and we will be back to little kids up chimneys and sacking anyone that could write their own name.....

john...

I would say not all jobs are suited to paying a morgage, the are generally talking about young people getting a few hours here. If the job can't meet your demands, maybe it's not for you, but it might be suitable short term. 

 

[Steve3948]

And in the old days being self employed almost stopped you getting a mortgage because you were deemed high risk.

In the 80's you could get a non declared income mortgage for a 0.5% extra on the mortgage, I was one of those and when interest rates got to 15% I almost came a cropper, got through it though and now things are lets say no problem.

I had a subby last year and they would not entertain him for a mortgage, he had to go on the cards and earn less money to get one, now that's just mad.

 

[Technician]

Steve; that was in the day when the government had control of

interest rates and using that control to "buy" votes.  Listening

to the Canadian import I am still absorbing the importance of

what he has said, i.e. using the jobless figures to be one of the

determinants of interest rate movements.  It flies RIGHT in the

face of traditional conservative party policy wherein there had

to be a persistent minimum number of jobless to assist in keeping

wages down.

 

[wozz]

Spoke to my sister (she's a strange one), she has two jobs, one is contracted 16 hours a week and one is zero. So she has 16 hours contracted a week. In reality she works 7-4 at one job and 4:30-12 at the other one, five days a week and maybe one shift at the weekend, been the same for a few years. 

She can't see a problem with them. Also I can't see that effecting her if ever she wanted to get a morgage as surely it goes on earning not contracted hours, last time I got a morgage they just looked at earnings ( I was paye), I may be applying for another in a few weeks and all they have asked for is a Sa302 which is a summary of earnings.