A middle-class culture of indolence

The Civil Service is not a job creation scheme for graduate professionals. Its primary purpose is not to provide a comfortable lifestyle – and an attractive “work-life balance” – to those who work for it. Taxpayers are required to forfeit an increasingly burdensome proportion of their income to the state, in order to fund public services and the bureaucracy that runs them. The very least they are entitled to expect in return is for those bureaucrats to see their role as serving the public, rather than themselves.

Regrettably, that does not always appear to be the case. There has been resistance, in particular, to ministers’ demand that civil servants should return to the office. One of the reasons, it seems, is that officials working from home have been able to get away with not doing very much work at all. In an interview with this newspaper, the government efficiency minister Jacob Rees-mogg says the data suggests that home working is more prevalent on Mondays and Fridays because it enables employees to extend their weekends. Would anyone really be surprised if it turns out to be more popular on days when the sun is shining, too?

But even the private sector has been infected by a “wellbeing” culture that prioritises the happiness of employees over productivity. Profitability and other business outcomes are largely irrelevant to the HR departments that are gaining ever-greater influence over how companies are managed. Some middle-class professionals, meanwhile, are discovering that they do not need to bother cultivating a work ethic. They certainly seem to feel no sense of responsibility for younger, less experienced colleagues who miss the social interaction of the office.

The great irony is that these attitudes have persisted even as the economy teeters on the edge of recession. The Civil Service may well face a reckoning if the Government follows through with its reported plans to cut tens of thousands of jobs. It is to be hoped that, this time, the cull will target the people who actually do have unproductive roles. It would also be better if the exercise started from first principles, by examining whether the state really needs to be involved in so many areas.

Unfortunately, it will be a harder task to uproot the new culture of indolence that has embedded itself in so many organisations. It may be that one of the legacies of the Government’s economic response to the pandemic, particularly the furlough scheme, is that it has encouraged a sense of complacency among many employees that they will always be protected should the worst happen. Somehow, they will have to be encouraged to face reality.

Lords revolt

In a spirit of reconciliation, Boris Johnson elevated a number of his erstwhile Tory opponents to the House of Lords. Philip Hammond, who had lost the whip for voting against the Government on a key Brexit vote, became Baron Hammond of Runnymede. Ken Clarke, another of the rebels, was also made a peer. They joined a host of other Conservative Remainers and soft-brexiteers in the Lords, including Gavin Barwell, who was Theresa May’s chief of staff when she was in No10.

Mr Johnson might now have cause to regret his attempt to heal the old Tory schism. If the Government does decide to introduce legislation to override parts of the Northern Ireland Protocol, it is likely to run into serious trouble in the Lords. The Conservatives do not have a majority in the upper House, and even some Tory peers will be unsympathetic to action that they consider to be a breach of international law. Plenty of them would have been content with a deal that kept the UK trapped in the EU’S regulatory and commercial orbit.

Perhaps it was a vain hope that the UK’S exit from the EU would put an end to parliamentary pitched battles over arcane Brexit-related legislation. The various attempts by MPS to constrain the government’s ability to negotiate, and block a no-deal outcome, threatened to stop Brexit altogether – and certainly undermined faith in the Westminster system. The House of Lords fulfils an important scrutiny role, but it would be dispiriting to say the least if whatever means ministers land upon to resolve the Northern Ireland stand-off were to be frustrated by unelected peers who never really accepted Brexit in the first place.

Vogue vs Vogue

What’s in a name? Plenty, it appears. Publicans Mark and Rachel Graham were astounded at a “cease and desist” letter from Condé Nast, the Vogue publishers, threatening legal action. For 200 years, their pub has been known as “The Star Inn at Vogue” – as in Vogue, the hamlet near Redruth, taking its name from the Cornish for “smelting furnace”.

Condé Nast seemingly thought this might confuse readers, though no unhappy fashionista has yet confessed to mistaking her copy of Vogue for a Cornish hamlet. The Grahams say their pub predates both the magazine and Madonna’s 1990 smash hit. (They weren’t consulted on this, either.) Thankfully Vogue vs Vogue is not set to become the next Jarndyce vs Jarndyce, as Condé Nast yesterday sensibly decided to U-turn. Perhaps it could now rename Vogue the Dog and Duck.