“Madame Borne is bluffing a little”, launches Cécile Clamme of the CGT

“Madame Borne is bluffing a bit”, launched Tuesday, December 7 on franceinfo Cécile Clamme, secretary general of the CGT Travail Emploi et Formation professionnelle (CGT-TEFP), while the Minister of Labor, Élisabeth Borne, announced that checks would be carried out “next week” in companies to check whether the extension of teleworking “to two to three days” per week to limit the spread of Covid-19 is “well implemented.”

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“Labor inspection agents have neither the human resources nor the legal means to impose teleworking in companies”, emphasizes Cécile Clamme. Élisabeth Borne announced that she was targeting 5,000 checks per month in companies. “Compared to the overall number of companies, we see that the threat has a very low scope”, remarks the representative of the CGT-TEFP. She believes that “the formal notice aspect is a somewhat complicated legal tool which is not suited to a health emergency situation”. So there is “a concern for troops and legal means”. It has 1,800 control officers at the Labor Inspectorate. “He is a control agent for 10,000 employees”. There is also “260 vacant sectors which do not have control officers”, that is “15% of sectors that are not covered”. At the Labor Inspectorate, agents are “guests” to telecommute “like any civil servant”, also points out Cécile Clamme. She points “inconsistency” between the fact “to go to companies” to do the checks and the obligation to telework.

To reach the “global figure” announced by the Minister, “instructs the agents to make do with”, explains the secretary general of the CGT-TEFP. “We have indicators. And we will go as a priority to companies where we have had indices to be at least effective.”

“5,000 checks reported to 200,000 companies that employ more than 10 people or a million companies that employ between one and nine workers, it will be just a drop of water.”

Cécile Clamme, General Secretary of the CGT Travail, Emploi et Vocational Training (CGT-TEFP)

to franceinfo

The representative of the CGT-TEFP also noted that the control of telework “can be difficult”, because there are “many arguments put forward by employers which are difficult to counter”. This may be “a software too greedy in bandwidth” or “a new hire who needs to be tutored”. The Labor Inspectorate, however, managed “to demonstrate, when digging, that many tasks can be teleworked.”

Cécile Clamme adds that teleworking “is a good way to protect employees who do not have to take public transport, who do not have to expose themselves to the risk of being contaminated”. She recognizes, however, that there is “Risks that are associated with telework and its generalizations. These risks must be analyzed and prevented.”