Gove vows to clamp down on councils adopting four-day weeks, claiming “taxpayers deserve 100% of the service”

The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Michael Gove, has criticised councils who are adopting a four-day working week “at the expense of others”.

Last month, South Cambridgeshire District Council announced that its trial of a four-day working week would continue, and it was reported that Norwich City Council is considering the scheme.

In an interview with The Sun ahead of the Conservative Party Conference, Gove said: “People who pay council tax work five days a week or longer.

“They deserve 100% of the service, not 80%. The idea that everyone should be slacking in this way at the expense of hard-working taxpayers is completely wrong.”

South Cambridgeshire began its four-day working week trial in January this year after only being able to fill around eight out of every ten of its vacancies.

In July, Local Government Minister Lee Rowley sent a formal request to the council to end its four-day working week trial, arguing that such an approach could impact its ‘Best Value Duty’ under the Local Government Act.

According to the council, the minister “reiterated his request” last month, raising concerns about seven specific areas of performance by the council during the trial.

Queries raised included the council’s “missed target” to re-let housing stock on every month of the trial, a reduction in the number of calls answered by the contact centre, and the number, when answered, that were resolved first time.

On the continuation of the trial, the Leader of South Cambridgeshire District Council, Cllr Bridget Smith, said earlier this month that the local authority wanted the trial to run for its full planned length, until the end of March, to gather data and assess whether a difference had been made.

She added that she was confident that the council had answered each of the points raised by Rowley in his letter.

In his interview with The Sun, Gove noted that during the pandemic, “it was important to make sure people, where possible, could work from home”.

However, he said: “It’s not a lifestyle shift - slacking, quiet quitting, all the rest of it. That is just a way of having some people maintain their quality of life at the expense of others.”

In response to Gove's interview, Cllr Smith said: “Every decision we make centres on what is best for the communities who elected us. Our offices are open 5 days a week, and we can be contacted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, when there is an emergency. Local councils should always be free to decide what is best for their residents.

"On the one hand Michael Gove tells us he wants innovation to drive down costs and provide high quality services, but on the other he wants to impose his own personal views on how we should deliver our services. We are best placed to make those decisions in an area with high private sector wages and housing costs which make it very difficult for us to attract and retain the talented staff we need to deliver excellent services for our residents and businesses."

Cllr Smith added: “Our initial 3-month trial saw performance maintained, and in some cases it improved. At the start of our trial, we were carrying a £2m annual agency bill as we had 23 roles we had found hard to recruit to. During the first three months of the trial, we filled four of those permanent posts reducing our annual bill by £300,000. We have now filled nine of those posts which could deliver £550,000 a year in savings. As time goes on it is becoming increasingly clear that recruitment has been positively affected, both in terms of the quality and number of applicants, and the consequent success in filling vacant posts.”

A spokesperson for Norwich City Council said: “The fact is that there are no plans for the city council to introduce a four-day week.

“It’s a great pity that the motion put forward by the council’s main opposition group has been so widely misconstrued.

“We would urge anyone genuinely interested in the facts to read the motion in full – they will then be in no doubt that the ruling political party considered the motion and simply said they will ‘explore’ any potential benefits.”

Lottie Winson