West Berkshire Council Timelord hybrid working plan gets go-ahead

WEST Berkshire Council's plans to close one of its offices in Newbury and move staff to a flexible hybrid working model have been given the green light.

The move, which was approved by the Conservative-run council’s executive on July 15, was called in by Liberal Democrat councillors, who questioned whether the decision should be made before the new chief executive Nigel Lynn takes over later this year.

Under the Timelord 2 project, the council will shut its offices at West Street House and West Point House, and move the 350 staff to join around 500 at its Market Street offices.

Staff will switch to one of three new working systems under the project – home, office or community, aka hybrid – and will be given an annual £150 working from home allowance.

Closing the offices at West Street House and West Point is expected to generate an annual revenue saving of £400,000 when they are fully closed and the sites sold, while the refurbishment of the Market Street offices and IT costs to meet the requirements is estimated to be around £691,000.

Residual savings are expected to be approximately £200,000.

In last Tuesday’s overview and scrutiny management commission meeting, opposition councillors accepted the direction of the plans but criticised the report which lays out the reasoning behind them, accusing it of lacking evidence.

Lee Dillon (Thatcham, Thatcham North East) said: “There are too many assumptions in the report without the evidence to back it up.

“We want to go further this way, but we’ll do it when we see the evidence to do it, not just blind faith.

“There’s no Sigma learning or process mapping, or it’s going to improve 0.2 per cent in this department or 12 per cent in this department, which means we can draw the workforce down there and we can put more staff on the workforce here.

“The plans should be backed up by core data that we as a board of directors can see and verify.

“That’s why it should be delayed, because you haven’t presented evidence to members for us to have the confidence to sign it off.”

Tony Vickers (Lib Dem, Wash Common) said: “I feel there’s no harm in delaying the formal decision for two or three months so the new man can be the man that leads us into this ‘site change’.”

Former chief executive Nick Carter retired last week after 16 years in the role, and will be replaced by Mr Lynn, who will start in the autumn.

Mr Carter assured councillors that the new chief executive was in favour of the plans and saw the move as a “natural evolution” following the pandemic and Timelord 1 a decade ago, when a large proportion of council staff stopped working from council offices.

Tory councillors argued that the minutia of the project would be undertaken in the next stage, when the practical details will be established.

The plans also came under fire from Unison West Berkshire, which accused the council of trying to shift costs for IT and other essential equipment on to the staff, and called for a greater allowance.

However, Mr Carter said: “We took the view that £150 a year was a reasonable amount of money for staff to use to provide facilities at home.

“Staff will need to provide a desk and chair, the council will provide IT equipment, but staff will have to, at their own cost, provide and maintain that facility.

“This is a contribution towards working from home – you are not being compelled to work from home.”

The plans were given the go-ahead, and the council agreed to review the arrangements six months after implementation.