Here we go again, the government trying to blur the lines between the professional and the personal.
Workers could get annual ‘health appraisals’ under government plans to crack down on long-term sickness.
Ministers are looking at giving companies generous subsidies to provide occupational health services.
Okay, in my rail career, I did have to have periodic health checks. But this was because I was in a safety critical environment and my health could impact on mine and others safety – much like a pilot, for example. So, where it is critical to the job then I have no problem and it already exists. However, outside of that, no, it is not a part of the employer’s remit and is none of their business. If someone has persistent health problems that impact their work, then there is already a means in place to deal with it, ultimately leading to retirement on health grounds. I’ve had to do that with an employee in the past.
According to the Sunday Times, the initiative could mean annual ‘health MOTs’ alongside normal appraisals to identify issues such as obesity.
It has apparently been backed by Health Secretary Steve Barclay who wants a greater focus on illness prevention to reduce the pressure on the NHS.
We pay for the NHS to fix us when we get ill. Any preventative measures are up to us. By all means offer advice, but there it ends.
‘Just like having an annual appraisal, you would have an annual health MoT, which would then be used to direct individuals to the most appropriate place for support.’
Fuck off. Seriously, fuck off and mind your own business.
The scale of the Covid hit to the UK workforce was laid bare last week as figures showed inactivity numbers have risen nearly twice as fast as expected.
This is a consequence of government mismanagement and nothing to do with health issues generally. So, yeah, fuck off.
It’s a short step from annual health appraisals to singing the Company song while performing daily compulsory calisthenics – before you start work. How very totalitarian.
I would be interested to learn how many of the over 50s ‘early retirees’ or those unable to work normally are in reality suffering the consequences of having covid jabs
Ian
I took early retirement, with 2 years to go to retirement age. I did this because a) I got paid a large lump sum of money to retire, b) because had I carried on to retirement age, I would not have had that lump sum, and c) after going back to work after furlough, the place had become a bullying woke nightmare. 2 workers committed suicide. New ‘enforcement’ teams paraded around the place like little Hitlers doling out face nappies and reporting anyone who put a foot wrong. One night, one of these little idiots stood there with a clipboard, asking everyone who passed by whether they were jabbed or not. I replied “none of your business”.
Apparently the company’s reason for offering early retirement/voluntary redundancy was because due to supply difficulties, from China mainly but Europe/USA too, orders could not be fulfilled even though the books were full. 500 employees took up the offer. Also all agency workers were laid off.
I retired in August 2020. However, in November 2020 I was called by HR and asked to go back for 2 weeks, on the same contract/pay. This was apparently to cover for those who were ‘self isolating’, or in other words, taking 2 weeks off work with full pay. I accepted this and was posted to a different factory. However, that 2 weeks turned into a full year, and I finally finished Christmas 2021. Since then I’ve been working as a pipe fitter for a mate, which is sporadic but suits me perfectly, as I have a house renovation to get back to.
I am, and will remain, totally unjabbed.
At a recent social gathering of 50-somethings, all retired and almost all fit as fleas, a quick straw poll established the following reasons for quitting:
2 x retired because spouse did (so they could move house)
1 x planned (worked years of overtime to fund early retirement and an end to commuting)
1 x illness (nothing to do with Covid)
and
4 x left reluctantly (and on reduced pensions) because of ‘management shit’: endless lecturing on diversity&equality etc/ intrusive micro-management/ loss of autonomy/ constant fear of being accused of ‘inappropriate’ behaviour or language (the stakes are high these days, especially in education).
Just been invited to s**t in a box and send it to the NHS. And I can do it without getting done for malicious communication too!
Can’t remember whose it was (so apologies for not crediting) but one of the first blog posts I read many years ago was on the subject of receiving a similar invitation to ‘poo on a card and return it’ and wondering whether all government correspondence should be treated in the same way.
One of the problems with this kind of screening is the tendency for false positives, resulting in invasive testing only to find nothing and maybe do more harm than good. Which is why my screening kits have all gone in the bin. If I get it, I get it. I’ll take my chances.
You should do exactly that – shit in the box – forget the little sample card – drop a large log in the box, preferably one from a Great Dane, seal it up and send it right back. You’d be surprised at how doing this with an Amazon box and leaving it on your doorstep deters parcel thieves.
LOL!
Responsible companies involved with products that have specific dangers ie dust/noise etc already have regular privately run health checks, in my industry we are checked every year, in particular lung capacity.
No reason for the govt to get involved.
Companies check their employees in case in later years they get sued for negligence. Prove they have taken reasonable precautions and the no-win-no-fee guys will not bother. The benefit for the employee is a bonus.
Early retirement. My own experience in engineering a few years ago. Companies are run by accountants. For them a fresh graduate is as good as a 50 year old non graduate with 30 years of experience. Plus the old guys had probably got rock solid final salary related pensions.
So the accountant want to unload the oldie before he accumulates even more pension, and makes a redundancy package he cannot refuse.
Plus oldie can see that the way things are going British Engineering is going down the gurgler. What do we still make?
I have experienced instances where companies and government agencies have offered a deal and every person over 50 has applied.
I did this and after a year of two of getting house right went back contracting for the same company. At greatly increased remuneration.
They were short of people with nous.
My brother had a growth in his large intestine that was found because of the shit sample screening. It turned out to be relatively harmless when he had it removed but they didn’t know that at the time that it was discovered.
Management shit was what did it for me too. My intention had always been to retire as soon as I could to, I had several private pension plans, but it came to the point when I really didn’t want to stay a minute longer than I had to.
I retired from teaching at 60 but not having been doing it long enough to earn a big pension, and fearing I’d end up rotting in front of daytime TV, I went to work as a hospital porter. I’m due my old age pension soon but I’m trying to negotiate reduced hours rather than give up completely. I’ve never had a job I’ve enjoyed more, despite all the issues with the NHS.
This is exactly like a lot of the Health and Safety stuff. It is a nifty wheeze to transfer the costs of any disease and/or injury to the employer rather than the State via sickness benefit and, as the article says, to minimise costs for The Holy and sacred NHS. Or as they phrase it, “to reduce pressure on the NHS”.
The Government want you to be a taxpayer and not cost them money. Forcing the employer to shoulder the costs of keeping you as a healthy cash cow to be milked is the aim. Change my mind …
We can already self assess our tax, sort household rubbish in to various bins and put them out for collection and are urged to do as much work for the government as possible on-line.
I guess we will shortly see packages of sterilised surgical instruments delivered to our homes, with a helpful YouTube link, so we can operate on ourselves ‘to protect the NHS’.
Think I saw something somewhere recently suggesting that anaesthetic should be rationed to save Gaia ?
Ministers are looking at giving companies generous subsidies to provide occupational health services.
Ministers are looking at taxing people more to give the money to their employers to reduce the burden on another area of government that they’re already taxed to pay for and is hilariously* under-performing.
Gotcha.
* Or it would be hilarious if it wasn’t so serious and bloody depressing
I don’t know what the workshop health monitors would make of my other brother, not the one mentioned in my earlier post, who seems determined to drink and smoke himself into an early grave. He’s four years younger than me but he looks as though he’s ten years older.
By calling it a health “MOT” they are designing it so that people will get used to it eventually becoming an actual MOT and it will be illegal for you to use your body unless it has passed government standards.
“I’m afraid you’ve failed your MOT, Mr Smith. We’ve put you down for your assisted dying appointment at 3pm this afternoon”.