Four-day week data at South Cambridgeshire District Council ‘shows trial is not working’, Tories claim
Conservative opposition councillors on South Cambridgeshire District Council have claimed the authority’s own figures show its four-day week trial is not working – but the Liberal Democrat leadership has accused them of being “dogmatic” and ignoring the benefits.
The Tories pointed to the council’s own report stating that some council officers are having to work more than four days to get all their work done and that some services are in decline.
The council’s cabinet is due to consider on Tuesday (12 March) whether the four-day week should continue for now, but with desk-based staff working 32 hours a week instead of 30. Those in the waste collection service, who are also involved in the trial, are already working 32 hours.
Councillors were told a wellbeing survey had been completed by 328 out of about 470 desk-based staff working a four-day week, under which staff receive 100 per cent of their pay for working 80 per cent of their time, but are expected to complete all of their work.
The report showed almost 100 council staff were working more than four days, with 53 per cent working an extra two to three hours a week, and 14 per cent working an extra six-plus hours a week.
The Tories noted that seven out of 16 areas monitored had stagnated or declined during the four-day week trial, which began with desk workers at the start of 2023 and was later expanded to bin workers. The trial was designed to aid recruitment and retention, and reduce spending on agency staff.
Cllr Heather Williams, leader of the Conservative opposition, said: “Right at the start of this trial, I raised my concerns that it would not be possible for officers to get their work done in four days. The papers very clearly show that I was right – even though I was dismissed by the Liberal Democrats at the time.
“We were told that if there was any decline in any service, the trial would be stopped. And yet the Lib Dems are ploughing on with the four-day week – even though the report shows decline in some services.
“Performance is being propped up by officers who are not doing a four-day week. It is not right that the Lib Dems are overseeing unequal, unfair working conditions. I appreciate the hard work that is being done by those individuals who have opted out of the four-day week. But it’s not fair.
“Officers cannot get their work done in four days. The Lib Dems are trying to cling on to their social experiment by making it four-and-a-bit days. They should just accept that enough is enough, it can’t be done.
“Residents deserve better. Let’s get taxpayers receiving value for money and getting what they pay for – five days’ work for five days’ pay.”
But the ruling Lib Dems claimed the Tories are being “dogmatic” and ignoring that the council has spent £434,000 less on agency staff, resulting in a net saving of £316,000.
Council leader Cllr Bridget Smith said: “As Lib Dems we believe in evidence-based policies and making decisions only once we have all the information available – not making rush judgement based on ideological grounds and threats from above.
“The Conservatives in South Cambs have no credible plan to address the recruitment and retention crisis and fail to recognise just how impactful the four-day week trial has been despite all the evidence piling up in front of them. Staff wellbeing is up, the number of (and quality of) job applications we receive is up, turnover is down, waste on agency spend is down – that the Conservatives are blind to these clear success stories demonstrates how fundamentally out of touch they are. As always, they’re putting politics above progress.”
The Lib Dems said they cannot hold a consultation on the four-day week at the end of March now because it is awaiting information from the government, which issued a Best Value Notice against the council in November and warned it is considering using “levers” in its funding settlement for local authorities in the coming financial year to “disincentivise the four-day working week”.
Cllr Smith said: “The government’s insistence on levelling threats against local councils means that we don’t have the financial information we need to be able to consult on this properly. If we consulted at the end of March like we had originally intended, we’d only have to repeat the consultation later once the government has got its act together.”
The Tories said the agency savings achieved were “miles off” what the Lib Dems had hoped for originally.
Prior to the trial, the council was spending about £2million a year using agency staff to fill 22 roles to which it could not find permanent recruits.