What oh what has happened to the office Christmas party this year of our lord, 2024?
For my generation, the locus classicus of this seasonal revel is that office party in Love, Actually, the 21-year-old Richard Curtis classic that feels like a glittery, sparkly bauble of days far away and long ago: so much so that Love, Actually is probably now used as a training film for HR and management as how not to have a Christmas party, as it falls merrily foul of every new guideline holding employers responsible for what staff get up to at an office party (more of that later).
Let me remind you of that scene in the much-loved Christmas family favourite first though.
In one storyline, Alan Rickman is the boss of some worthy charity dedicated to saving starving children. His wife is the saintly Emma Thompson, the sister of Hugh Grant, who is Prime Minister. In the key scene for the purposes of this column, the couple are at Rickman’s office Christmas party, held in some lofty gallery space in Central London with huge blow-ups of nudes on the walls to get everyone in the mood. There are female nipples. There are male bums. There is a free cocktail bar.
Rickman’s new assistant is a much younger, much less mumsy female. Mia, for that is her name, has chosen as her attire for this occasion a slinky, strappy red mini-dress and red horns, so everyone knows just how freaky-naughty she plans to be at the Office Christmas Party. The message of this look is, Mia has brought her whole and very available self to this work social…but perhaps not her best self.
As soon as Emma Thompson sighs and leaves Alan Rickman to do the “duty round” as the wife, Mia sneaks up behind Rickman, taps him on the shoulder and smoulders, “Any chance of a dance with the boss?” and the rest is definitely not the title of a new Goalhanger podcast, as it’s a mess.
Rickman is infatuated with Mia, Thompson is downcast, and on Christmas Day all is revealed as MIA gets the gold necklace she’s spied her husband buying and Thompson only gets the Joni Mitchell CD and cries to a Joan Baez soundtrack.
But even I have to accept that times have changed
Now, as I mentioned, this year we have as our festive treat the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023. These new amendments came into force this autumn, and as a result it’s impossible to imagine such a Love, Actually party in woke, cost-of-living conscious 2024. Dancing! Cocktails! Mingling! The bottom-line expense of hiring a Central London venue at the peak of the party season!
Plus, these new rules impose an 'anticipatory duty' on employers to prevent sexual harassment, including harassment by third parties such as clients or customers, both at work-related social events like Christmas parties and after-work drinks.
There is no way Curtis could have written that scene now, as Rickman’s charity would have been bound to “roll out” something called “safeguarding” at an event that is, in its very nature, unpredictable as a Trump press conference.
An office party is, by definition, an event at which a bunch of people who only know each other through work, of both sexes, all ages, and varying pay grades, who nurture either crushes or resentments or both on their fellow co-workers, talk and drink and more into the night. It was always expected to be a recipe for disaster, and it often was.
In the old days, of course, bosses allowed nature to take its course in the stationery cupboard or on the photocopier, and a veil was mostly drawn the next day. But now, employers are legally bound to make sure nothing untoward can happen. No wonder many corporates are cancelling as it's too risky to have a party these days. In one of my workplaces, for example, we all got a very welcome and generous John Lewis voucher instead of a party.
I am all for free speech, and a life-long libertarian. Therefore I don’t think it’s the job of governments or companies to police employees any more than they do, at work or at play.
But even I have to accept that times have changed and it’s no longer a sparkly happy Richard Curtis film where love really is all around. Sad. That’s a much happier place to be than the grey moral managerialism of Starmer’s Britain, where Christmas dos have turned into Christmas don’ts, and it's all more HR than ho ho ho.
Rachel Johnson is a contributing editor of the London Standard
