The Daily Mail reported this yesterday:

Council Staff take two ‘stress sickies’ a year

‘Every council worker in England and Wales had more than two days of work with stress on average last year costing taxpayers more than £500million.’

Did they mean ‘On average every council worker in England and Wales had more than two days of work with stress last year costing taxpayers more than £500million.’

I certainly hope so as, on several readings of the opening sentence, I was feeling aggrieved that I had somehow missed out on an extra two duvet days.

We received an email at work on Thursday which said ‘given the pigeon problem in the building we will use the services of a hawk, once a week, for a year in an effort to solve the problem. The hawk will be here on Tuesday morning between 8am and 9am.’

‘Great’ I thought ‘I’ve got to come in early on Tuesday to see this’. I wandered into the office next door where C works and asked her if she had seen the email and wasn’t it exciting? ‘A hawk, C, flying around the building chasing out the pigeons. I’m just wondering about the mess. I‘m going to come in early to see it but will wear a hat just in case.’ C looked at me as if I was crazy. ‘Katie, they don’t mean in the building. They mean in the general area. You really think they are bringing a bird of prey into the building? Anyway, have you ever seen any pigeons flying around the office that need chasing out?’ There followed a debate involving all those in the office and people were split right down the middle. Some thought the same as me, others believing that the thought of a hawk in the building completely mad and surreal. My argument was strengthened by someone mentioning they has seen a pigeon flying around a room on the floor above a few weeks ago but it wasn’t enough to sway the doubters. Someone eventually took themselves off to ask our service boss if it was true that a hawk was going to be in the office on Tuesday morning. He came to ‘reassure’ us. ‘The hawk will be, hooded (for me this just added to the excitement) and used outside the building to scare away the pigeons. It will not be coming in and there is no need to be scared’. ‘Why then’ I asked ‘did the buildings manager bother to email us?’ ‘Ummm’ said our manager trying to think on his feet, ‘oh, because hardly anything happens in the building department and they just got excited about this and wanted people to know’. For the rest of the afternoon bird noises kept coming out of his office, and when ever he walked past he flapped his arms and squawked. 'Well I’m crushed.’ I said to C afterwards over a glass of wine in a local pub. ‘That would have been cool, a hooded hawk flying around the office. I’m still not convinced anyway. I’m still going to come in early on Tuesday, just in case’. ‘Me too’ said C ‘because now I think you are right.’

Stressed? Us? Well, not yet although our jobs aren’t safe and any ‘perks' that we currently enjoy are being removed - along with the support of each other as we are being relocated to the ‘jewel in the crown’ building next month. A building without character, charm or any soul. Ok, so it is unlikely to have pigeons (I have, however, heard rumours of cockroaches). It has great views, cool drinks machines and lovely places to visit in your lunch break. But the people who work there that are discouraged from any form of individuality. Music is banned. Laughter is frowned upon. Conversations are rare. Snacks at the desk are seen as a breach of conduct.It is a building meant for robots. But not robots that will do the job more effectively or with improved outcomes for the service users. Someone who works there said to me recently ‘some people have forgotten they are public servants and the very people they are meant to be serving are forgotten as they get seduced by this corporate image and bureaucratic routine’. And I am sure the stress levels of these ant like workers will increase over the coming year or so and the opening line of the Daily Mail report may be prophetic instead of just inaccurate and poorly written.