A council has rejected concerns that its introduction of a four-day week could lead to potential conflicts of interest after it emerged some staff have second jobs.
South Cambridgeshire district council, which is led by the Liberal democrats, was urged to boost employee monitoring after an internal survey suggested nearly one in six were undertaking paid work during their extra day off.
A motion by independent councillor Dan Lentell backed the four-day week, introduced in January 2023 and heavily criticised by Conservative ministers at the time, but warned there should be further action to prevent conflicts of interest under the code of conduct for officers.
The code stipulates that employees should not use their position to benefit themselves or others, and potential conflicts of interest must be declared.
Considering the motion on Tuesday, South Cambridgeshire’s cabinet agreed not to take any further action, arguing that safeguards were already in place and the four-day week had led to service improvements.
In November, Labour withdrew guidance established by the Conservatives which said the Government does not support a four-day working week in local authorities.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch later challenged Sir Keir Starmer on the issue at Prime Minister’s Questions, saying a four-day week is not flexible working “but part-time work for full-time pay”.
The previous Conservative government sent South Cambridgeshire two Best Value Notices in November 2023 and May 2024 as ministers called on councils to halt four-day week trials.
Best Value Notices detail the Government’s potential concerns with an authority and set expectations of what needs to be done.
However, South Cambridgeshire said the previous government found no evidence that the four-day week had led to the council failing to meet its responsibilities to taxpayers.
Facing criticism of the four-day week from Conservative councillors during the cabinet meeting, John Williams, cabinet member for resources, said: “The last government were hostile towards us on the four-day week. If they had found something and we weren’t delivering best value, they would have taken action.”
He added: “If you look at what has happened is that we have actually saved money because we have not been employing agency staff.
“Those very hard-to-fill posts are now filled by full-time employees giving us a better service than we did before.”
Mr Williams said contracts clearly stipulate that staff cannot take on extra work which could cause a conflict of interest, but admitted the council relies on “staff to tell us and to seek permission for second jobs”.
He added that staff are not permitted to carry out second jobs “during the time when they should be working for the council”, which applies to both working and non-working days, and the council maintains a register of those in additional employment.
The 2024 staff survey found 62 of the 69 people who said they were undertaking other paid work on their non-working day are in the Waste service, but the councils said it is “not uncommon” for these workers to take on second jobs.
“All employees who said they have a second job confirmed that they had it before the trial,” the council added.
The Public and Commercial Services Union has called for an extension of the four-day week, saying the move is “critical to attaining a good quality of life” and could help save the Government more than £21 million a year.
A Government spokesperson said: “It is not government policy to support a general move to a four-day working week for five days’ worth of pay.
“Local authorities are independent employers who are rightly responsible for the management and organisation of their own workforces.”
