Table of Contents
BEST IELTS Academic Reading Test 502
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST 502 – PASSAGE – 3
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST – 502
READING PASSAGE – 3
Short shrift
The benefits of employing part-time staff are well known, but little has been done to improve the quality of, or access to part-time work. The long awaited consultation document on part-time work had the potential to tackle the long hours culture, underpin the government’s family friendly stance and encourage flexibility in the labour market, but the reality is disappointing. Opting for a light touch, the regulations fail to improve the quality of part-time work or to aid the development of part-time work on a voluntary basis.
More than six million people (a quarter of the workforce) work part-time, including nearly one million men. Two categories — wholesale, retail and motor trade, and health and social work account for 45 percent of part-time jobs, with many more in the hospitality industry. The increase in part-time work has been a major feature of employment trends in the past decade, but most jobs remain low-paid and low in status.
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Many employers already acknowledge the key role that part-time work plays in employment strategies. Tesco, for example is on record as describing its part-time workforce — which makes up 65% of the total — as the ‘lifeblood’ of the organisation. Labour supplies can be tailored to trading peaks and demand for ever longer trading hours.
Furthermore, specialist jobs do not always require full-time cover, particularly in smaller organisations. Christine Pointer, a chief executive with a local authority who works with limited budgets, finds it better to employ a more senior professional on a part-time basis, rather than a less qualified person full-time. Part-time work at senior levels also helps to retain key staff who might otherwise leave the organisation. Unfortunately, not all employers recognise these potential benefits. In the health service for example, where few such opportunities exist, many doctors leave despite the high cost to the state of training them. And the insurance sector has lower levels of part-time working than any other area of financial services.
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Sadly the widespread view that part-time work is primarily attractive to women with caring responsibilities is reinforced both by legislature and organizational culture. The growing trend for men to seek a better work/home balance is being ignored. Women have managed to negotiate limited access to part-time work at senior levels on the back of equal opportunities legislation. But the assumption remains that there is something odd about men who want to work part-time — they lack ambition and commitment to their employer.
Disabled employees represent a large proportion of the workforce that could benefit from part-time work. The labour force identifies over two million economically active people with a long term health problem or disability. It also shows that nearly fifteen million people of working age judge themselves to be covered by the Disabilities Discriminations Act’s definition of disability. This includes almost one million who are not working but would like to. For many of them, part-time work is the simplest ‘reasonable adjustment’ that an employer can make.
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On access to training for part-timers, the consultation document again disappoints. While placing an obligation on employers not to exclude part-timers in principle, there is no legal requirement to structure training to accommodate them. New technologies can and do provide flexible access to training — making this omission inexcusable. Ironically the government is on record as saying that competitiveness depends on the UK making the best use of the talents of as many people as possible and that the larger the number of people to which business can look, the better. However, little is done to encourage the development of these talents in the workforce.
Similarly nothing has been done to alter the perception of part-time work is a ‘woman’s issue’. A recent press release states ‘the new measures will simplify the legal position for part-timers — 80% of whom are women — who will no longer have to go down the indirect route of claiming discrimination under the sex discrimination act’. Wonderful! But occupational segregation is still maintained by gender.
Anna Allen People management February 2000.
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Questions 27-32
Choose one phrase from the box to complete each of the following key points. Write the appropriate letters A-I.
NB – There are more phrases than key points so you will not use all of them. You may use any of the headings more than once.
List of phrases
A. Many of them are voluntary.
B. Most of them are poorly paid.
C. They don’t have to provide training at appropriate times.
D. If they want to work part-time.
E. If they can’t work part time.
F. Would like to work
G. Part-time senior professionals.
H. Wouldn’t be able to work full-time.
I. Less qualified full-time employees.
J. People would prefer to work full-time.
K. Part-time female employees.
L. They don’t have to offer training to part-timers.
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27. Although there are many more part-time jobs,
28. Often smaller organisations prefer to hire,
29. Senior staff might leave the organisation,
30. Men are thought to lack ambition,
31. Nearly one million disabled people
32. Although employers are required not to discriminate against part-timers,
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Questions 33 – 40
Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS, complete the following statements.
Part-time employees can adapt to 33…………. better than full time staff.
Many organisations assume that part-time work is only attractive to 34……………..
Part-time work is available for women at senior levels because of 35……………..
Men who want to work part-time are considered to 36……………..
Employers could help 37…………. to find work by allowing them to work part-time.
New technology has made access to training 38………………
Despite statements to the contrary, part-time work is still seen as a 39……………
The new legislation is designed to make 40………….. of part-timers clearer.
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ANSWERS
27. B
28. G
29. E
30. D
31. F
32. C
33. TRADING PEAKS // DEMAND
34. WOMEN
35. EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES LEGISLATION
36. BE ODD // LACK AMBITION // LACK COMMITMENT
37. DISABLED PEOPLE // EMPLOYEES
38. FLEXIBLE
39. WOMAN’S ISSUE
40. THE LEGAL POSITION
IELTS Academic Reading Test