I've been told to return to the office... but I live in Italy [LBC Legal Hour]

[@spencerbungard4962]

Housing officer not actually viewing or inspecting any housing. WTF. My heart bleeds for this poor women being exploited by this ruthless council. No wonder the countries fckd.

[@EppingForest304]

I thought housing officers had to meet clients & show the homes… I guess not!

[@Liberty_Freedom_Brotherhood]

😂😂😂

[@MRW515]

A housing officer manages a specific geographical area of housing and services on behalf of associations, local authorities and charities. In this role, you would maintain consistent communication with residents and deal with maintenance, complaints and nuisances on a situational basis.

[@atverde]

How naive to think you can just join a union after you have an issue

[@Believe-you-me-]

How can you visit the stock (homes), when abroad?

[@Reba-123]

Housing officer in Italy what the hell !!! How was that allowed in the first place ??? That makes absolutely no sense .. I have so many questions !!!!!

[@thomasdalton1508]

Daniel missed a key question - did the local authority agree to her working from Italy? If so, was it agreed as a temporary thing or permanently? If it was agreed as a permanent change to her contract, they would struggle to unilaterally change it back. I suspect it was only ever intended as a temporary thing, though, in which case she doesn't have a leg to stand on. Someone at the local authority messed up if they agreed to it permanently.

[@patrickshearerfilm]

50yrs in the work force not in the union, then happy to join when it suits her! 🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩

[@КурочкаКрашена]

Lots of people choose not to belong to a union. I myself am in one but I know people whose unions are dreadful, awful at negotiating, and as a result have achieved no goals despite regular strike action. You don't know the ins and outs so you shouldn't judge.

[@patrickshearerfilm]

​@@КурочкаКрашенаscab

[@ulysees321]

Bet she hasnt told hmrc as there is tax concerns for working abroad

[@green4661]

Bet she hasnt told Italy either plus being in Italy over 90 days means tax needs to be paid in Italy not UK!!

[@green4661]

183 days in Italy.

[@ulysees321]

@@green4661 100% this, i work remotely and my employer has made it explicitly clear I'm not to leave the UK due to tax concerns and become a digital nomad whilst working for them, the fact she works for a local authority i think she is taking the piss a bit

[@mintywebb]

​@@green4661if she was in Italy before the UKleft the EU the 180 day a year thing does not apply to her.

[@Dilligaf-m7s]

I haven’t listened to this but the first thing that comes to mind is data security anytime she is accessing work info from another country she is creating a security risk. Not sure but she might be more screwed than she thinks and an employment lawyer will not be able to help with the fallout. Edit just read the transcript I can’t believe he didn’t mention the data breach she may have caused or the tax rules she may have broken and caused the local authority to break. I think she has 3 choices move back to the uk and start doing what her employer has asked, quit her job or the worst choice for her fight it, and end up with no job, fines in the thousands and possibly jail time.

[@allykhan8594]

No wonder my council bill is £220/month.

[@tracer1127]

Why don’t employees understand that the company is paying them to work for them not offer them some I’ll do what I like employment deal. Why should the other employees bother to turn up whilst others decide that it’s not for them. How about the company put in a grievance on the grounds that they have an employee that thinks she’s the boss.

[@Trevor_Austin]

What is unreasonable is being able to work abroad for three years. The rest of the planet works in an office five days a week. Boo boo, my heart bleeds.

[@ResevoirGod]

No they don’t you absolute Luddite

[@dog-jk2hn]

You must have a really happy life to be as joyful as you are.

[@Minimmalmythicist]

I think another potentially tricky issue is whether she can have an employment contract with a UK public body and live in Italy as her permanent home. If she wants to continue in Italy, she´s probably best off retiring.

[@coderider3022]

Her tax would be a mess too, doubt her self assessment are in order as with her Italian requirements.

[@thomasdalton1508]

I expect she can, but it is potentially very messy. You can generally get away with it for a few months, but if you are actually resident overseas it causes all sorts of problems.

[@Minimmalmythicist]

@@coderider3022 There is a double tax treaty with Italy, so theoretically she should be able to not pay tax there, though this stuff can often be complicated and you need an accountant to sort it for you really

[@Dilligaf-m7s]

I hope this goes crazy and her employer finds out. 😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@coderider3022]

WFH … from Italy? Know lots who moved jobs during Covid and relocated to areas not practical to commute that are now told to be in office. Changing country is too much.

[@QWeb76]

Unless her husband was Italian and they moved to Italy together before he died, I'm interested to know how she got a visa to live/work in Italy. It's really, really difficult, especially as her job does not contribute to the local economy. Alternatively, she's returning to the UK for 90 days out of every 180 days, in which case she probably can return to the office (albeit at a cost for travelling, but not necessarily when she would prefer). Or (with certain irony), the Italian local authorites do not know she is there.

[@dolomiti850]

She's working from Italy but not in Italy

[@QWeb76]

@@dolomiti850 What do you mean?

[@dolomiti850]

@@QWeb76 She's not employed in a Italy, so a non-work visa (tourist visa or family reunification visa) would have sufficed for her purposes.

[@HottyHelen]

Italian government would be interested in her tax situation. Could have guessed she’s working for some local authority or another. Her job sounds like she needs to meet people face to face, handle paperwork.

[@parametr]

@@dolomiti850 you also need a visa to work from Italy. Also, her UK employer might be liable for employer social security contribution to Italy, and to collect income tax for Italian authorities. Also, depending on the job you do (I don't know about her case), having a permanent resident in a foreign country can mean that the employer is considered to have a branch in the foreign country. Which means there's tons of Italian laws/paperwork they have to take on. Turns out you can't just take advantage of a foreign state without contributing to it. They have rules about it.

[@franks.8022]

Housing Officer 100% remote? Even if most of the admin can be done online and she obviously isn’t frontline, there will always be the occasional meeting with (potential) tenants, contractors, suppliers or third party housing associations. I find it hard to believe that she has done this job for 3 years remotely without any problems.

[@Trevor_Austin]

By keeping quiet and doing bugger all you can disappear off the radar. I bet someone said “Claire? Claire who?” Then HR realised there was a person on the payroll not present.

[@johntheoldmod]

She sounds like a typical local goverment employee who wouldn't last a week with a proper commercial employer, how on earth can a person be paid taxpayers hard earned to do a job like that from another country ? Their full time office hours don't even add up to 40, when so many of us have had to put in at least 60 hours a week during our working lives to make ends meet and now she feels hard done by and considers joining a union after the event, its like buying home insurance after your house catches fire and expecting help.

[@wilgapoda3780]

😂😂 well said

[@stevecave3191]

I feel a fool working self-employed for 40+years going to a job every day average 50 hours per week just to pay for all people that barely work for the public/government sector what a world we live in

[@olaa5534]

Clare needs some clearing on how she goes about Hybrid working from Italy, one of the epicentre of Covid in Europe during the pandemic.

[@fluxington]

A non sequitur, if ever I've heard one.

[@robkewley]

Most public sector employers dont allow you to take their IT kit out the country. Do they even know she is aboard?

[@indiechoices]

My work agreed for me to work in the office once a month after a lot of negotiation, so I could be equidistant between the office & my poorly father - but I made sure it was written in to my contract so they can't all of a sudden get me in full time. The 2 hour drive in for a meeting that everyone else dials in on Teams does grate a bit though...

[@colinward1007]

Cant you arrange to do your one day a month when others are there?

[@indiechoices]

@@colinward1007 I do! They just decide not to turn up. Quite the waste of petrol.

[@eileenball3336]

Nice one, just drag it out that should solve it at a cost to the Council Tax payers when there's talk of withdrawing the 25% single person's allowance.

[@grahamo22]

100:1 sasy she signed an actual employment contract which says 100% working in the office is the basis of the employment. And she says she is working "incredibly effectively" however its 100:1 that everyone else in the office thinks she is slacking all the time.

[@gogovideo10]

This should be an absolute wake up call to everyone out there. JOIN A WORKERS UNION. I don't care if you've never had problems in the workplace in your life, I don't care if your employer is non-union, I don't care if you're unemployed at the moment! (well actually, make sure you look after essentials first) Having a union's support is crucial in winning cases, especially if you don't want a huge bill hanging over your head at the end of it. You may never need their support, but that's why we all pay in, so the support is there for the members who do! It's often less than the price of a netflix subscription, just join one!!

[@angietowey]

Claire either move back or resign or take early retirement! Youve been lucky to get 3 years abroad in a council job that tax payers are paying!

[@blockwhisperers8352]

The game is up and It was good while it lasted… all good things come to an end. To get 3 years out of it was amazing

[@green4661]

This is why Housing Officers dont do their job, never visit their blighted housing. 2 days a week in office. They are meant to be visiting their tenants, obv. different roles within housing but they are funded by taxpayers.

[@CeticWales]

Always join a union.

[@loc4725]

I'm in a Union, one of the bigger ones and to be totally honest mine hasn't been good value for money. One rep' was actively hostile to coworkers, one rep' did nothing during a redundancy consultation even though there was evidence of improper procedure and our current area rep' doesn't seem particularly bothered unless the issue is in his specific workplace. And at one point things go so bad that people *from other sites* had non-union representation at first stage hearings.

[@SlapCabbage08]

I guarantee that other people in her office are being tasked with the jobs & duties she cannot do because she lives Italy. People generally are ok taking up the slack for other’s personal circumstances, but this is pushing it. (The cheek of joining a union just to help herself out of this situation tells us everything)

[@blueskies666]

Housing officer in Italy…..

[@andyptv1996]

She belongs in prison

[@keithw9290]

She's ridiculous.

[@karenlee7711]

Then she needs to give uo her job .so the money they oay her gose back Into the country

[@paul8161]

Whoever thought the commute to Italy 🇮🇹 to the UK for two days a week wants to work and do that trip and fund it ,to see how ridiculous that request is! Utter buffoons

[@NibberKSmooth]

No way should she be commanded back into the office.

[@angietowey]

Why not? They probably don't know she has been working / living in Italy for the past 3 years!

[@darklighter66]

Course she should.