A LibDem-run council has announced plans to make a trial four-day work week permanent, sparking fury from critics. Staff at South Cambridgeshire district council had been enjoying a four-day week trial since January 2023, and bosses have now announced it will be made permanent.
The announcement comes despite highly mixed feedback from residents in a survey. A staggering 26 councillors voterd in favour of the policy, with just nine opposing the move arguing taxpayers’ cash shouldn’t be used to pay staff for an extra day off work. The four-day week sees council staff receive the same pay for a day’s less work each week, though are expected to complete all their work in that time.
A report published by South Cambridgeshire authority found a number of areas where the trial had led to a “statistically significant decline” in work output, including housing rent collection, the average days taken to re-let housing stock, and the percentage of tenant satisfaction with responsive repairs.
A residents’ survey also saw a “significant decline in satisfaction ratings” from before the four-day trial was introduced, as residents slammed the quality of service on key functions like bin collections, climate and environment, communications, council tax, the customer contact centre, elections, and environmental health, licensing, and the planning service.
Responding to the announcement, the Taxpayers’ Alliance – a campaign group dedicated to fighting for value-for-money – said: “Local taxpayers will be utterly disgusted by the decision today, which has been taken with complete disregard for the people of South Cambridgeshire.
“Local residents have made it clear the contempt they hold for the radical four-day week experiment, yet Lib Dem councillors have pathetically folded in the face of pressure from the senior leadership and voted to make the part-time council permanent.
“Angela Rayner must surely now recognise the dangers of town halls going rogue, and should be using every weapon at her disposal to ensure no local authority decides to follow South Cambridgeshire off the cliff.”
The LibDem council leader Bridget Smith said that the trial had “exceeded” expectations, telling councillors: “This is not about working less, it is about working smarter.
“We are living in the 21st century and this is the way of working for organisations like us is smarter working, not longer working, and that delivers improvements. It is not perfect, where we fall short of residents’ expectations we will work harder to improve, and now we can do that.
“The four-day week is the future and South Cambridgeshire District Council is part of that very bright future. Members please support the recommendations and move this council permanently into a four-day working week and the 21st century.”
Tory opposition member Dr Shrobona Bhattacharya said she had received over 300 emails from people criticising the scheme, arguing it would be creating an “unfair system”.
Reform UK’s Zia Yusuf quipped: “The Lib Dem run council said a trial found ‘services remained stable’. I bet moving half the staff to 0 days a week would deliver the same.”