Work from home, help save the planet and live a better life.

It’s been a truly tragic couple of weeks in the history of the UK. We’re living through an event most of us hoped we’d never experience and would never have dreamt in even the most vivid nightmare. At the moment it is right that we focus most of our energies on those recovering, ill or dying and try our best to support our health and social care institutions in their fight against Coronavirus. But what is the future for our country, our economy and jobs?

We’ve seen work change overnight. Many are experiencing remote working for the first time. I know the majority have adapted well but that some haven’t. Its understandable people miss office colleagues and the routines of daily life. But we need to ask ourselves hard questions about whether a return to normal is sustainable? We’ve all seen pictures and evidence of the huge reduction in pollution and human movement leading to fresher air and recovering nature. Wouldn’t it be a gift for the future of our world for us to try our best to embed any positives we have seen delivered by this terrible pandemic?

As a member of the Lib Dems I think we get the privilege of thinking outside of the box. So I ask fellow members and those sympathetic to consider pushing for the adoption of a policy of promoting and boosting remote working with an aim to make it as common as alternatives.

A policy of actively encouraging remote working would…

• Massively reduce traffic on the roads with consequential reductions in pollution.
• Decrease the need for additional infrastructure and investment in roads and motorways.
• Decrease the space in cities dedicated to servicing and storage of vehicles.
• Reduce our need for more public investment in big rail and other public transport infrastructure.
• Reduce existing numbers travelling on infrastructure.
• Give us an opportunity with a sizeable drop in demand for public transport to consider adopting the Luxembourg example of national free public transport and further reduce unnecessary vehicle journeys.
• Enable those currently paying through the nose for rental property in larger cities to move outside these areas, buy housing and spread the economic wealth of our nation outside of London and the South East.
• Provide resilience for businesses and our economy should this ever happen again.
• Provide huge cost savings for businesses which would not have to pay for office space, insurance and services for large numbers of workers.
• Free up land currently used for office space for development of homes and open spaces.
• Boost local towns and high streets with more people shopping closer to where they live and work.

I know there are major hurdles to this. Many companies would need to make significant investment and Government would need to legislate and provide financial support in some areas. However if we take this hideous event as a chance to reconsider our way of working I believe we can come out of this with a stronger, more resilient economy, a happier and more productive workforce and a healthier and cleaner world.