Recently, the government of Ningbo, a city in Zhejiang province, announced a change in working hours for civil servants. The new work schedule will be from 9:00 to 12:00 in the morning and from 2:00 to 5:30 in the afternoon, giving them a six and a half hour working day.

That total is 30 minutes shorter than before the new rules. Officials say the move is aimed at easing rush hour traffic. The cut in working hours mimics other provinces such as Guangdong, Fujian, and Hebei.

A survey by information website, infzm.com carried out a poll asking people their opinion on the shorter work hours for these public servants. Seventy-six per cent of the respondents said shortening the working day shows the current workload of public servants is not enough, and so there should be staff reductions.

35 Chinese civil servants were recently fired after they were found to be chatting online and watching movies during office hours. The sackings were announced by a government supervision bureau in the southern city of Guangzhou.

As more and more office workers spend time on the net, the temptation to chat online grows - and the line between personal and work use of the computer can become difficult to define.

In today's straight from the street, we asked people: do you think it is justified to chat online during office hours?

Experts here say the Honda factory strikes could just be the tip of the iceberg as China's workforce make greater demands for decent wages and working hours. That's right.

Analysts say that younger factory workers - having grown up in a time of relative prosperity - will find it increasingly difficult to accept low pay and grueling work hours the way previous generations have. China's rapidly aging population also is expected to boost labor's leverage as the number of working-age Chinese dwindles to about half its current portion of the population by 2030.

There are labor shortages in many export-driven coastal provinces because of rapid development in China's interior. And several provinces and major cities like Shanghai have had little choice but to raise minimum wages. And the Honda strike appears to have worked – the workers have been offered a 24 percent pay rise that would bring monthly salaries to about $281. So is striking the answer? Is downing tools and refusing to work the best way to improve working conditions? Or are there more constructive ways to improve things in the workplace? That's a question we put to people in today's Straight from the Street.

Oil On The Beaches
Carmakers Move Downmarket
China's Energy Use Trends
Is Beijing Too Big?
Forty Hour Week For Whom?
Pigs Bring Profit For Farmers

It was a hot, stinky mess. Here in Anping County in Hebei Province, locals had no electricity for stretches of up to 22-hours. That means no water, rotting food, classes without overhead projectors, a county hospital shutting down every few days. Forget modern conveniences. This move was for the sake of the environment. Anding Country split the electricity grid into three sections and each power supply was alternately turned off for 22 hours, meaning residents and businesses were left for bouts without electricity.

China's migrant workers are vital to the country's  development, yet they toil long working hours for low salaries and have little job security. Now, as BON's Tom Spender reports, one developer in southern China has found a novel way to recognize their contribution. 

It may not be just an idle threat. The world's top search engine, Google, may well be leaving China for good. Last week, the company says it could no longer abide by the censorship rules it promised to obey when GOOGLE-DOT-CN was launched just four years ago.

Within hours of the announcement, Google appeared to be defying Chinese censors, displaying results for sensitive topics that were previously banned in China. Flowers have been laid outside Google's Beijing offices in a mock funeral for the company.