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Nearly one million workers in the UK are on zero-hour contracts. A further five million are nominally self-employed. In modern Britain, flexibility is often presented as a way of reconciling pressures between work and family life.

Sally Brett, Head of Equality, Inclusion and Culture at the British Medical Association, will pose the question: what kind of flexibility do workers want and need? The ability to vary working hours from the standard, full-time pattern or to secure time off for family reasons is important to working parents and carers, particularly women, who are still the primary care-givers in most families. But it\\u2019s not just flexibility that matters. Control over working hours, adequate notice of working hours and predictability and certainty in working hours are important too. Employers who respect employees\\u2019 life and responsibilities outside of work are likely to benefit from higher engagement, lower sickness absence and lower turnover.