Business owner divides This Morning viewers as he says working from home is ‘selfish’

6 August 2020, 10:56 | Updated: 6 August 2020, 11:16

Charlie Mullins says Furlough should end so people can get to work while on holiday in Marbella

Charlie Mullins appeared on This Morning to slam the government Furlough system and those working from home.

A business-owner has divided This Morning viewers after he claimed people are ‘selfish’ for continuing to work from home during the pandemic.

Charlie Mullins - who owns London-based Pimlico Plumbers - told hosts Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford this ‘stupid culture’ of people ‘sitting at home’ needs to stop.

Speaking from his holiday in Marbella, Charlie said: “The majority of people are in a position to go back to work but don’t want to.

“If you’re paying anybody to sit at home and do nothing, that’s what they’re going to do. We get the economy going and stop this stupid culture of people sitting at home and thinking they can get paid for it.”

Journalist Kirsty Hulse, who runs a marketing company, then hit back that employees should have the choice to work from home to fit in with their lives.

But Charlie was not convinced, and slammed home workers as ‘selfish’ and ‘counter production’, as people are not investing any money back into the economy.

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He said: “People are sitting at home in their pyjamas and are not motivated enough to do a proper day's work.

“You’re going to find the situation they’re not going to get out and about, but everybody should be pulling their weight and trying to get the economy going.”

This Morning viewers divided as business-owner claims staff are 'abusing' the furlough system

He then added: “This is the biggest way to increase unemployment, so many more businesses are going to go bust.”

And it looks like ITV viewers are totally divided by Charlie’s opinion, as one person Tweeted: “@thismorning what is this Chris guy talking about! My husband works so hard at home and certainly more productive!”

“Why are you giving this Charlie bloke a platform? People can work from home???? My parents have worked from home all throughout covid and they’ve been more productive and still contributing to the economy??? This is ridiculous!!” said another.

But another follower hit back: “I’m with Charlie 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻,” and a fourth agreed: “@thismorning I agree with Charlie I was so unproductive working from home, so happy to be back with my colleagues.”

The discussion comes as it was revealed only 34% of Brits have returned to the office following lockdown, with the numbers around 75% in Germany, France and Spain.

Charlie himself has had to let go of many members of staff after coming off the Furlough scheme, making ten redundant and terminating the contracts of ten others.

Accusing some employees of ‘milking’ the government payout system, he went on to say: “We have a situation where people don’t want to come back into work, a lot of them have been milking the system.

“I’m not going to pay people to sit at home, it’s the wrong way to go about it so I’ve pulled the plug on it completely.”

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