Angela Rayner insists four-day working can ‘boost council productivity’ and is ‘no threat to the economy’ [Video]

18:51 EDT 29 Oct 2024, updated 05:08 EDT 30 Oct 2024

A four-day working week is ‘no threat to the economy’, the Deputy Prime Minister has said as she vowed to ‘work with’ town halls.

Angela Rayner suggested four-day weeks, which the previous government described as ‘part-time work for full-time pay’, could improve productivity in local government.

Conservative shadow local government secretary Kemi Badenoch described the arrangement as ‘unacceptable’ at the House of Commons despatch box on Monday.

South Cambridgeshire District Council, which allows its employees to ‘deliver 100 per cent of their work in around 80 per cent of their hours for 100 per cent of their pay’, received a best value notice from the then Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities last November, warning that ‘the removal of up to a fifth of the capacity of the council means that it is unlikely, in aggregate, for it to be able to support continuous improvement’.