The new year will bring big changes to office work rules for many employees across the country, including tens of thousands of provincial government employees in Ontario and Alberta who will soon need to return to the office full-time.
Starting Jan. 5, Ontario government employees are expected to work in the office five days a week.
The Alberta Public Service is also returning to full-time office work in February to “strengthen collaboration, accountability and service delivery for Albertans,” an Alberta government spokesperson said.
While some provinces, including Manitoba, British Columbia and New Brunswick, are maintaining more flexible hybrid work rules, others are reviewing their policies.
A spokesperson for the Newfoundland and Labrador government said the province is considering a remote work policy.
The Northwest Territories government is also reviewing its remote work policy, although a spokesman said it has no plans to require employees to return to the workplace five days a week.
Plan to come to a “clearer view”
It's still unclear when federal government employees will have to increase their tenure and by how much. Prime Minister Mark Carney promised last month that the plan would soon become “more clear.”
Carney said his government would “engage with public sector unions on” return-to-office policies, with details of the plan to be released “over the next few weeks.”
Carney gave little information about his views on this issue. He said the amount of time government employees would spend in the office would depend on individual titles and seniority.
The current rule, effective September 2024, requires federal government employees to work in the office a minimum of three days a week, and managers to work four days a week.
Treasury Board President Shafqat Ali told The Canadian Press in December that the federal government had not worked out the details of a promised return-to-office plan. According to him, negotiations are underway in the government, but “nothing has been finally decided.”
Return to the cabin
Several banks, including BMO, Scotiabank and RBC, have already ordered their employees to increase their presence in offices to four days a week.
Other private sector companies are also making policy changes. Amazon, for example, is requiring its corporate employees to be in the office five days a week as of January 2.
Provincial and federal public sector unions have opposed return-to-office mandates.
The Ontario Public Service Employees Union, which represents about 40,000 government employees, said in a news release in August that the provincial government decided to order all its workers to return to offices full time “without regard to the realities facing public service workers.”
In a statement, the Public Service Alliance of Canada, Canada's largest federal union, said Ottawa's push to force federal workers to spend more time in their offices is “completely inconsistent with what's best for workers and taxpayers.”
“If this government tries to make radical changes to remote working in the middle of negotiations, we will oppose them. Nothing is off the table – we will challenge them in court and in our workplaces,” the statement said.
A recent survey by Angus Reid shows that most workers would prefer a fully remote or hybrid workplace, but many employers are choosing to bring employees into the office more often.
Catherine Connelly, professor and chair of business studies at McMaster University's Faculty of Human Resources and Management, said more resistance from unions should be expected in the coming months.
“A lot of their members really enjoy working from home and want to maintain the ability to work remotely,” Connelly said.
Some employees find that working remotely helps them save money and be more productive, Connelly said. Others, she said, may find that working remotely undermines their work-life balance or that they can't make as many connections as they could in the workplace.
Connelly said she's not sure private sector efforts to increase office workforce presence will continue as companies realize their top talent values flexibility.
Companies can also start improving their remote work policies by adding more rules for employees who work from home — such as requiring childcare up to a certain age or requiring employees to be available for a certain period of time, she said.
Municipalities are divided on the issue of remote work, which has had a number of impacts on their economies.
In the National Capital Region, home to a large number of government employees, many downtown businesses suffered as government employees worked from home during the COVID-19 pandemic, while many areas outside of downtown Ottawa saw growth.
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said he believes adding another “day or two” in office is possible. He said the city is working to expand public transportation options and open the next phase of its light rail system.
“I'm looking forward to seeing how [return-to-office] plans are progressing,” Sutcliffe said in December. “We want to see our downtown thriving and prosperous. The last few years have been difficult times since Covid.”
Liberal MP Bruce Fanjoy, who represents eastern Ontario, which has more than 10,000 government employees, said he hopes for “flexibility” when employees return to the office. This will allow the federal government to retain and attract employees, manage its office space and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, he said.
“Many of our biggest challenges in cities come from the fact that we require everyone to be in a very small space,” Fanjoy said last month. “A little dispersal of government employees will benefit all the economies of our local communities.”
