More than 100 business and charity leaders have called on ministers to \u201clead the country\u2019s transition toward a shorter working week\u201d, after the local government secretary criticised a council for shifting to a four-day work pattern.<\/p>\n
Steve Reed wrote to South Cambridgeshire<\/a> district council, the first English council to trial a four-day week, raising concerns about performance and value for money, and expressing his \u201cdeep disappointment\u201d over the policy.<\/p>\n In a letter leaked to the Telegraph<\/a>, he claimed an independent report<\/a> had shown performance \u201cdeclined in key housing-related services including rent collection, reletting times and tenant satisfaction with repairs\u201d.<\/p>\n On Thursday, more than 100 leaders across multiple sectors signed an open letter to the business secretary, coordinated by the 4 Day Week Foundation, urging the government to create a working time council to guide the shift towards a shorter week.<\/p>\n \u201cAs business leaders, trade union leaders and advocates who have witnessed the successful transition to a four-day working week (with no loss of pay) in many contexts, we can say with confidence that it is not just an idea for the future \u2013 it is already delivering results today,\u201d the letter states.<\/p>\n \u201cFrom different sectors and company sizes, we have all witnessed the same outcome: shorter working weeks are not only viable, but transformative.\u201d<\/p>\n The leader of South Cambridgeshire council, Bridget Smith, also hit back at Reed\u2019s comments, saying she was \u201cextremely disappointed\u201d by his letter, and that independently assessed data showed the vast majority of council services had either improved or remained the same during the four-day week trial.<\/p>\n She disputed Reed\u2019s claim that staff performance had declined and said her colleagues had done \u201c100% of their work in 32 hours each week\u201d since the four-day week was introduced.<\/p>\n \u201cOur financial analysis indicates that as a result of the four-day week we are saving a net \u00a3399,000 per annum, in large part due to eliminating our reliance on agency staff to fill positions,\u201d she said in a response to the government.<\/p>\n Joe Ryle, the campaign director at the 4 Day Week Foundation, said Reed\u2019s comments were \u201cfrankly ridiculous\u201d and made the government look \u201coutdated and stuck in the past\u201d.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n Get the day\u2019s headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com<\/a> to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n \u201cWe know four-day working weeks and flexible working is good for workers and businesses, that has been proven time and time again. The council overall is outperforming, compared to other councils in the country, so cherrypicking these three areas does seem odd and frustrating,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen it comes to the private sector it has been quite widely embraced, hundreds and hundreds of companies have successfully implemented four-day weeks in the last couple of years, but as soon as it enters the public sector, that is when it seems to be contested.\u201d<\/p>\n Another 25 councils across the country are reportedly also planning to trial four-day working weeks next year. The government has no legal power over council working patterns, meaning ministers can apply pressure but not impose a ban on four-day weeks.<\/p>\n Analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) reported that more than 200,000 workers have switched to a four-day week since the Covid-19 pandemic. The 4 Day Week Foundation estimated that at least 430 UK companies have adopted a shorter week in the last few years, which includes over 13,000 workers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than 100 business and charity leaders have called on ministers to \u201clead the country\u2019s transition toward a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":233590,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-233589","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233589"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}