Lord Alan Sugar says workers should get their ‘ar*es back in’ to offices

Businessman Alan Sugar does not like the idea of people working from home.

The Apprentice star – whose Amshold Group staff members are already back to their offices in Loughton, Essex – does not care that workers can accomplish the same amount of work away from an office and is urging the government to insist workers return to office spaces.

Writing in his column for The Sun, the wealthy entrepreneur, 73, claimed that his staff members “want to be at work” and fumed that government needs to tell citizens to “Get your ar*es back in there now.”

He penned: “My people want to be at work, they enjoy talking to their friends and colleagues to discuss what’s going on with the football, what’s on telly, who’s going to win The Apprentice — all that type of stuff.”

Sugar continued: “I do believe that an air of ­complacency has been created during this emergency.”

He fumed that London is like “a morgue” before adding: “The Government needs to say: ‘Get your ar*es back in there now’. Same with local councils. Big business isn’t helping either.”

The TV face added that even if people can work from home they should go back to work as he thinks the “economy and our kids’ futures depend on it.”

Lord Sugar’s demands come after a survey created by academics at Cardiff University and the University of Southampton revealed that 88% of employees who worked at home during lockdown would like to continue doing so in some way.

Professor Alan Felstead, based at Cardiff University and the Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research, Data and Methods, who conducted the research has commented on the findings.

According to Metro, he said: “What is particularly striking is that many of those who have worked at home during lockdown would like to continue to work in this way, even when social distancing rules do not require them to.

“These people are among the most productive, so preventing them from choosing how they work in the future does not make economic sense.

“Giving employees flexibility on where they work could be extremely beneficial for companies as they attempt to recover from the impact of Covid-19.”

The report looked at data gathered for the Understanding Society Covid-19 Study and was made up of three surveys by the Institute for Social and Economic Research, University of Essex, from April to June.

It questioned a sample of 6,000 to 7,000 workers.

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