Flexible working hours for elderly, pregnant women

ISTANBUL — The head of the State Personnel Office Mehmet Ali Kumbuzoğlu said on Monday that flexible working hours for public sector employees will offer expecting mothers the peace of mind that they will be able to retain their jobs. "We are planning to provide an alternative for mothers or pregnant personnel who work with this system. We will propose a type of shift where we can give pregnant personnel or working mothers a two-year leave without pay if they wish or they can do half-day shifts for five days a week. We aim to present this alternative also for public personnel who have to care for disabled or seriously ill relatives. "Another concern is preparing our public personnel over 60 years of age for retirement. We think that it would be better to prepare our personnel in this category for retirement not suddenly but step by step, thus their social lives will not be affected," Kumbuzoğlu said.

Mehmet Ali Kumbuzoğlu noted that 6,000 disabled individuals were employed in the public sector as officers in 2002 while that number climbed to 33,000 as of 2014..