Bin crews could soon be putting their feet up on a Monday as the wave of four-day-week trials spreading across the UK finally reaches frontline public services.
South Cambridgeshire district council has agreed to test a 32-hour working week for 150 refuse loaders and drivers this summer after successful experiments with reduced working hours with office- and laptop-based staff. Workers who investigate fly-tipping, undertake dredging and are council caretakers will also try the new working pattern.
Pay will remain the same and the council has assured householders that they will receive the same service, if not better. It is hoped that the city council, with whom the district shares waste services, will agree to the plan in the coming months.
It could cost £339,000 extra over two years, according to council papers, as an increase in staff and new lorries are required. Savings are expected to be made by a reduction in the use of agency staff as working on bin crews becomes a more appealing prospect.
Joe Ryle, the director of the 4 Day Week Campaign, which has helped steer trials in the private sector, said: “We have always said the four-day week must apply for everyone, so it is brilliant the first ever trial for blue-collar workers in the public sector has been approved. It’s only fair that public-sector workers and those in non-office jobs benefit too.”
The decision follows the world’s largest trial of a four-day week in the UK, which resulted in 56 of the 61 companies taking part carrying on with the test, and 18 making the arrangement permanent.
Companies involved ranged from the Charity Bank in Kent to Rivelin Robotics in Sheffield. Among the firms that struggled were Allcap, an industrial supplies company, which tried a nine-day fortnight and found that after “nine extreme ones – once [employees] got to their scheduled day off, they were exhausted”.
Nevertheless, polling last week showed that 58% of the British public expected a four-day week to be the normal way of working by 2030, with only 22% believing it would not.
Bridget Smith, the leader of South Cambridgeshire district council, said that as part of preparations to make the trial a success, bin routes had been rationalised to reduce wasted time and “everybody will be working more intensely and productively”.
Bin crews have typically worked 37-hour weeks – but the job is known as “task and finish”, which means it can be done more quickly or slowly.
Henry Batchelor, the council lead for environmental services, said: “Nationally and locally, it is often difficult to recruit staff, especially at the waste service. To help deal with this, and further support the wellbeing of our hardworking crews, we need to try something new. For us, that is a proposed four-day week trial, which we have been testing successfully among our desk-based colleagues since the start of the year.”
Before the wider trial started, the council was spending about £2m a year on agency staff. It estimates that this bill could be halved if all these posts were filled permanently. The trial has so far cut the annual wage bill by £300,000.
The GMB trade union, which represents refuse workers and has been in discussions with the council, said: “The union is cautiously positive but we are constant dialogue with our members to ensure there are no unforeseen equality issues or detriments to terms and conditions.”
