Department of Health to continue home working

THE Department of Health and Social Care has ditched its diktat on civil servants returning to the office amid a row over mandarins continuing to work from home.

Staff at the department were told this week that plans to return to working in Whitehall between four and eight days every month from September were no longer going to be enforced. This messaging puts the department at odds with Downing Street, who said there should be a gradual return of mandarins to the office over the summer.

It came as an anonymous Cabinet minister told the Daily Mail that civil servants who work at home should have their salaries cut because they have had a “de facto pay rise” by not paying to commute. “If people aren’t going into work, they don’t deserve the terms and conditions they get if they are,” the minister said.

Members of the Cabinet are now planning a “big push” to get civil servants back to the office from next month, it was reported last night.

A Government spokesman said: “The Civil Service continues to follow Government guidance, as we gradually and cautiously increase the number of staff working in the office.”