Fact check: Council’s four-day week means staff paid 100% for 80% of usual hours

Following Wednesday’s Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs), a social media user posted: “Kemi Badenoch at #PMQs complaining about 4-day week. She thinks staff get an extra day off – less hours for same pay! She fails to realise that 40hrs over 4 days is still 40hrs!”

Evaluation

South Cambridgeshire District Council first trialled a four-day working week for some staff in January 2023, which has seen workers get 100% pay but only work around 80% of their hours.

On November 8, a few days before Mrs Badenoch’s comment during PMQs, the council was sent a letter from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to say a letter it had previously sent with concerns about the four-day week scheme had expired and would not be reissued.

On the same day, the Government withdrew guidance that said it does “not support a 4-day working week in local authorities”.

The facts

During PMQs, Mrs Badenoch asked Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer: “Does he think it appropriate to approve – as the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has done – a four-day week for councils? That is not flexible working but part-time work for full-time pay.”

South Cambridgeshire District Council started trialling a four-day work week in January 2023 for some staff, saying the model would mean people “deliver 100% of their work, in around 80% of their hours (or pro rata for part time colleagues), for 100% of their pay”. It was initially meant to last for three months, but was then extended for a further 12 months to March 2024.

Since the trial began, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities – later renamed the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government – has sent the council two Best Value Notices in November 2023 and May 2024 after it continued with the four-day working week arrangement. The Conservative government had asked councils to stop four-day week trials. Best Value Notices express the government’s potential concerns with an authority and set expectations of what needs to be done.

On November 8, the now Labour-led ministry wrote to the council to say that the Best Value Notice had expired and would not be reissued, which was a few days before Mrs Badenoch’s comment was made during PMQs. On the same day, the ministry also withdrew previous guidance which stated that the “government does not support a 4-day working week in local authorities”.

In addition, one of the items on the agenda for a Cambridge City Council Strategy and Resources Scrutiny Committee meeting on March 25 2024 was an update on the four-day week trial. The leader of the council agreed the hours for South Cambridgeshire District Council colleagues working a four-day week (desk-based and waste operations), “are harmonised at 32 hours per week (pro rata for part time colleagues) at 86.5% of contracted hours” from April 1.

Although South Cambridgeshire District Council adopted a four-day week which sees people work roughly 80% of their hours for 100% of their pay, some workplaces have four-day week arrangements where employees may work the same total hours they would in a five-day week but squeezed into four days. The social media user mentioned they have this type of work arrangement.