Give us our share of holidays, say many

While many of us have been enjoying some well-earned time off during Eid this year, others have had to keep turning up to work every single day.

It is at times like this that private sector workers who get fewer days off than their public sector counterparts could be forgiven for feeling a touch aggrieved.

On the question of should public sector and private sector holidays be unified, a whopping 91.7 per cent of people said yes.

The response to the question: "Should public sector and private sector holidays should be unified?" was twice as great as that normally seen to a Gulf News poll and 91.7 per cent of those who answered said yes.

As reported in Gulf News, currently the private sector is granted 10 holidays annually, while public sector employees get 13 or 14 days.

Gulf News took to the streets to find out what a cross-section of Dubai residents thought about having time off.

Taiwanese housewife Jenny Chao, 29, said it would be "fairer" if the public and private sectors got the same holiday allowance.

"I am not working now, but when I was employed in the private sector I did have a sense of grievance that I had fewer holidays," she said.

Security guard Arun Thampi, 27, from India, took the same view, saying that many in the private sector worked long hours and so deserved to be given days off work.

Norwegian yacht broker Beate Grodum, 32, took the view that there was no need to make employers give non-Muslims Eid itself off, but they should be forced to give staff who have worked over the festival time off later on.

"A Christian or a Hindu or a non-Muslim does not have to have Eid off it is not a holiday we celebrate but they should take the equivalent days off at another time.

British teacher Diana Lund said "absolutely" private sector workers should get as many holidays as those in the public sector.

"The private sector always misses out. I am a teacher, so I am very lucky as I get a lot of time off, but I have lots of friends who have ended up just having one day off over Eid.

"Particularly for Muslims who have been fasting, it would be great benefit for them to have the whole of Eid off work," she said.

Despite the overwhelming victory for equalising holidays in the Gulf News poll, there were plenty of people who thought it would be wrong to put public and private sectors on an equal footing.

Sylke Faerber, 41, a German who works for car manufacturer Volkswagen, said it should be left to individual employers to decide how many holidays staff get.

She said there was no need for holidays over Eid to be made compulsory for everyone when many people working in the UAE are not Muslims and therefore do not celebrate the festival.

"It's silly to say Christians should get this time off," she said.

Egyptian Mohammad Al Saeed, 30, who works in a restaurant, said that many businesses including the one that employs him had to continue functioning over Eid so it was unrealistic to expect the workers to get time off.

"We cannot have a holiday because people want to come here and eat and meet their friends here. Maybe afterwards we should get time off but not over Eid itself," he said.

Hassan Naim, 38, from Lebanon, who runs his own decoration and interior design company, said many firms would suffer hugely if they had to follow the holiday patterns of the public sector.

"It would never work. In the private sector, if people don't work, they lose out. In my company, if we have a project we have to do on time, you have no option but to do it. You cannot take time off.

"We pay staff that work on Eid overtime and bonuses so they are well compensated. They are getting double time.

"Each company has to be left to make its own decision," he said.

There was a similar view expressed by Devan Bhatt, 41, from India, who works as deputy general manager for a multinational construction company.

"The private sector is driven by targets and deadlines, whereas the public sector has very set goals and they can work at their own pace, so they cannot have the same number of holidays as each other.

"The private sector has its share of holidays anyway and I think these are good enough considering it has its own goals and profit targets. It cannot keep itself away from working for a long time," he said.

However, his wife Lopa Bhatt, 40, a teacher who is also from India, took the opposite view. "I get my holidays but often I am at home when my husband is still working so I don't enjoy it.

"With my children, I am just waiting for him to come back so we can do something as a family. I would like it if we had the same holidays and could spend more time together," she said.