In our always on, 24/7/365 modern-day culture, there are few places where one can be assured of being left in peace. Or to put it another way, there should be very few impediments left to staff productivity.

Thanks to advances in mobile phone technology which have transformed the little talkie device in our pocket into a small computer, remote workers can get down to some serious number crunching no matter where they are. And no matter where they are, they're always just a call away from the office.

Aircraft, underground train systems and hospitals have for their own various reasons been exempt from this little trend of course, much to the frustration of middle managers everywhere. But now finally, one of these last bastions of peace and quiet is set to fall, after ministers today said that NHS Trusts should allow patients, staff and visitors the "widest possible use" of their phones.

Although the Department of Health has stated that mobiles should continue to be banned where they may interfere with critical hospital equipment, it has now been decreed that they could give patients a vital lifeline to the outside world, to make their stay less stressful. That is, Sneak suspects, unless work calls while you're recovering from that nasty hernia operation.