Working from home bureaucrats leave Canberra a ghost town

Canberra’s economy is being crippled by stay-at-home public servants as small businesses in the nation’s capital are hit by a massive loss of trade.

Furious small business owners in Canberra have slammed the federal bureaucracy’s ‘ridiculous’ working from home policy, which has crippled their turnover and left some owners considering closing their doors.

While most of Australia has been ordered back to the office in some capacity, staff employed by the $37 billion Commonwealth public service continue to enjoy some of the most flexible and generous work conditions in the country.

For the past 12 months, the majority of federal public servants have been able to request an ‘uncapped’ amount of working from home days, with bosses obliged to favour the request.

The Commonwealth employment condition, which also requires bosses to show a ‘bias’ towards a request to work from home, has resulted in the Opposition accusing the Albanese Government of ‘showing a lack of concern for small business.’

The Daily Telegraph travelled to the ACT last Friday and witnessed cafes and restaurants near major bureaucratic agencies resembling a ghost town between 10am and 1pm.

‘It’s ridiculous. In an average week, we currently have only two full days of trade’ one hospitality boss said.

A cafe in Barton, servicing multiple Commonwealth public service buildings with only three customers. Picture: Martin Ollman

‘And it’s random. It feels like they (bureaucrats) wake up in the morning and it’s raining, they’ll just stay home. But I still have to come here and open up, employ staff. If things are going to continue this way - I will have to walk away’

Another restaurant operator added: ‘we’re definitely down compared to previous years.’

‘To be honest, it’s just incredibly inconsistent and random. For example, Wednesdays are either really quiet or really busy. You can’t really plan or prepare for it. When there are people at their desk, we are really busy. Sometimes we can have dozens of people for lunch, then the following week, almost no one’ they said.

This masthead spoke to almost ten hospitality operators in the ACT for this story. Every business said the public service flexible working agreement, plus the compounding factors impacting Australia’s economy, had badly and overwhelmingly impacted their trade this year.

Curiously - they all declined to go on the record over fear of impact on their business.

‘You’ll struggle to get any local MPs speaking out against it. This is a public service town’ said one local member of the ACT Parliament.

An empty cafe inside one of Canberra's major bureaucratic agencies.

Shadow Employment Minister Michaelia Cash added ‘the Albanese government has encouraged the work from home culture in the public service. It is a tragedy that the livelihoods of small business operators are being compromised.

‘There are a lot of questions about the value for money work from home arrangements are providing for taxpayers’ Senator Cash added.

According to recent data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there are now more than 365,000 people employed by the Commonwealth public service, a number which has increased by 22,000 under Labor. Roughly a third of them are based in the ACT.