Work-from-home policy to stay - Ismail Sabri

 

The work-from-home policy for both the public and private sector will continue to remain in force, Defence Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said.

This is even though the country was showing signs of flattening the Covid-19 infection curve with states that were previously placed under a movement control order (MCO) moving to a conditional MCO.

"The National Security Council meeting yesterday was informed that the work-from-home policy continues to stay even for all states currently placed under conditional and recovery MCOs," Ismail told a press conference today.

For states under a conditional MCO, he said, only 30 percent of officers are allowed at the workplace for both public and private sector bodies.

He, however, noted that 100 percent of the number of supporting staff are allowed at workplaces.

For states under a recovery MCO, the staff of public and private sector bodies can operate at full force at their workplaces.

"However, it is still up to the department head to execute these instructions according to their respective working methods," said the minister.

The work-from-home directive was issued last year and was slated to begin on Oct 22 after the country then showed signs of flattening the Covid-19 curve and the government opened up more economic activities under the conditional MCO.

Ismail also said the government will allow live events for the creative industry to be held from tomorrow.

For live events in conditional MCO areas, the government is allowing an audience of up to 50 percent of the seating capacity, subject to physical distancing.

For live events in recovery MCO areas, the audience size just has to be based on the size of the venue, subject to physical distancing.

The permitted live events include official government programmes, TV programmes, arts and music, dance, theatre, comedy, cultural performances, and livestreaming.

The banning of live events during the MCO period gravely impacted the creative industry, Ismail said, where 30,000 workers in the film industry, 10,000 in the music industry, and 45 large-scale live events were cancelled, with the total number of those affected exceeding 300,000. - Mkini