{"id":6134,"date":"2025-12-23T04:32:21","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T04:32:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=6134"},"modified":"2025-12-23T04:32:21","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T04:32:21","slug":"councils-warned-against-adopting-four-day-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=6134","title":{"rendered":"Councils warned against adopting four-day week"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div data-component=\"text-block\">\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Local Government Secretary Steve Reed has written to all council leaders in England warning them not to introduce four-day working weeks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">As reported by the Telegraph, the letter is understood to say that &#8220;council staff undertaking part-time work for full-time pay without compelling justification would be considered an indicator, among a wide range of factors, of potential failure&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">He added that he hoped he had made the government&#8217;s policy &#8220;unambiguously clear to all councils&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">A Labour source said &#8220;Voters deserve high standards and hard work from local councils, and seeing council staff working a four-day week just won&#8217;t cut it.&#8221; <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-component=\"text-block\">\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">&#8220;They should get on with the job and make sure residents get the best service possible five days a week,&#8221; the source added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">In the letter to the councils, which was <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.telegraph.co.uk\/politics\/2025\/12\/22\/councils-told-not-to-adopt-four-day-week\/\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 iCaRzc\" rel=\"noopener\">reported by The Telegraph<\/a>, Reed says that local authorities should not be offering &#8220;full-time pay for part-time work&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Reed previously expressed his <a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cz7p12r8x13o\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 iCaRzc\" rel=\"noopener\">&#8220;deep disappointment&#8221;<\/a> in the first UK council to adopt a four-day working week.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">South Cambridgeshire District Council, which is led by the Liberal Democrats, became the first to make a permanent move to a four-day week in July after it began trialling a shorter working week in 2023.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Reed said there had been a decline in performance in the council&#8217;s housing service and he sked how the local authority would &#8220;mitigate&#8221; this.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">The government can intervene in any council if it is deemed to be failing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Last year Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer also rejected civil servants&#8217; demands for a four-day working week.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">Critics of a four-day week say it would reduce productivity and slow economic growth but others disagree. <\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\"><a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/crlz6rwl95do\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 iCaRzc\" rel=\"noopener\">A trial in the Scottish public sector<\/a> this year found an increase in productivity and improvements in staff well-being.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 eZyhnA\">The Autonomy Institute, which was commissioned by the Scottish government to co-ordinate the pilot, found that 98% of staff judged morale and motivation to have improved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>#Councils #warned #adopting #fourday #week<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Local Government Secretary Ste&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6135,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[242],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6134"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6134"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6134\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6134"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6134"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6134"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}