More Councils to trial 4 day week for 5 days pay

[mrsm43s]

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/green-party-four-day-working-week-lambeth-council-lewisham-hackney-b1299448.html

So what do you think about this? Apparently in South Cambs, the trial was successful leading to cost savings snd improved staff satisfaction, and is now a permanent arrangement.

Personally, I'm all for it, but must admit it's because I work for a local authority, and the more councils that adopt this, then the more likely I am to benefit from it in the future. That said, as a Council tax payer, I can understand people being upset at ever rising CT bills when staff are being handed a free day off a week.

Often the individuals are working very hard but due to difficulties in recruiting are trying to do 3 people's jobs. Attractive policies means teams don't have vacancies which means more work gets done.

If working 4 days is seen as a perk of working for a local authority, then bin men deserve the same perk

If they didn't break the law, lie etc in other departments, then there wouldn't be a need for a subject access request

Who said they didn’t? I don’t care if they work two days if my bin’s emptied.

Yes, therefore it would be good to know if they will be receiving the same perk. My post was to highlight that all local authority staff should have the same perk, not just office staff. I wouldn't care if anyone worked 2 days, as long as the work got done

If they can get all their work done in 4 days. That means they have an extra day to sort out other issues.

Like there are still so many issues to sort out they can continue sorting that out.

So, if the bin men worked for two days, but got paid for five days, you would be OK with that, right?

Providing your bin is emptied, of course.

When private companies do this, whether it’s compressed or reduced hours, employees have to ensure they’re productive enough to justify the change or they’ll be put back on 5 days if company profitability starts to tank.

There’s no profitability pressure for councils, no shareholders etc. So when they move to compressed or reduced hours, it’s us taxpayers paying the salary bill rather than that coming from company profits, and there’s no proper oversight about whether the change is working well.

So I’m afraid I don’t support this move for councils in their current form with very little oversight. I’m all for private companies adopting reduced / compressed hours, as my taxes don’t contribute towards their employees’ wages.

Yes.

I'm with Blossom on that. Provided my bin is emptied Who gives a shit what the bin men do the rest of the time.

I completely agree. I think it takes the absolute piss because it’s courtesy of the tax payer! (Yet again)

if they can get their work done in 4 days then they should be paid accordingly.

If you get paid for 5 days and finish all your tasks in 2, there's 3 extra days you can be doing work and tasks. Like there'd be streets to clean etc. There's always work to do

You see the obvious problem, I hope.

That would be a terrible waste of resources and taxpayer money, and has more in keeping with the former GDR.

The councils and LA issues aren't all done in 4 days. There's still time to work do tasks.

I had to constantly report on KPIs /performance to councillors. And they in turn were accountable to the public who could choose to vote them out. It feels way easier being in a private organisation where we aren't at the whims of the irrational and poorly informed public.

If you don't like something why not write to your councillor. Or attend a council meeting and speak about it? Or read any of the numerous reports on the website?

If you raise a complaint and don't like the response you can go to your local MP or the Ombudsman. (Or the ICO if it's DP/FOI related). There's loads of scrutiny and accountability out there if people want to get involved. But often even at a Cabinet or Full Council meeting only a couple of members of the public would appear

This really does boil my piss. I worked in the private sector, worked four days, but still worked 39 hours over 4 days.
If this happened in the private sector, less hours same pay, the country would collapse.
The public sector don't have to make a profit, they just take our taxes and couldn't give a f--k what the rest of us think.
That and their gold plated guaranteed pensions and total job security.
I don't like swearing, but they really fucking piss me off .

Because I already have a demanding job, and don’t need a second one holding councillors to account in my spare time.

Council leadership should do an adequate job of ensuring services are run effectively - but thank you for confirming my view that they don’t, given that your solution is to burden already busy members of the public with acting as council management.

Exactly this

It was no surprise to read OP's comment that "'In my experience LA staff don't slack, they generally work very hard" - I wouldn't expect anything else from a fellow LA worker who hopes for the same deal - but as a professional recruiter it wasn't my experience of the sector

There are good reasons why some companies regard prior LA employment as an automatic reason to not consider an applicant, and this kind of expectation is one of them

Isn't it just compressed hours? 35 hours over 4 days rather than 5 days. I think it's a great idea. Maybe because I have asked for compressed hours twice and been fobbed off 🙂

No its not. It is just a 20% payrise.