Council’s £18m HQ almost empty as staff follow ‘absurd’ Covid rules
A NEW council headquarters that cost taxpayers £18million is standing almost empty because staff are being told to stay at home months after Covid rules were abolished.
Cambridgeshire county council’s New Shire Hall is at risk of becoming a white elephant, as bosses insist on social distancing, which even the NHS has now abandoned.
Members of the public who visit the building report being told that no one works there, and the council yesterday refused to provide details of how many staff are still working from home.
A former minister said it “beggars belief” that council workers are still being told to avoid coming to the office when the world of work has returned to normal elsewhere.
Meanwhile, the Lib Dem-labour coalition that runs the council is refusing to hold full council meetings in the building. Its Covid rules mean no more than 22 people can meet in a chamber designed to hold more than 80.
New Shire Hall opened last summer after the council decided its old headquarters in Cambridge were outmoded, and built its new base in Alconbury, near Huntingdon, saying it would save the public £40 million over 25 years.
But it has used a skeleton staff ever since, and when The Daily Telegraph visited the site yesterday, there were just three cars in its car park. A receptionist blamed “Covid guidelines” for so many staff still working from home.
A council spokesman said it was “incorrect” to suggest that no one was working at the building, but confirmed that some council buildings remain closed, that numbers have been dictated by “social distancing and ventilation requirements” and that “numbers using the buildings will further increase as virus levels continue to decline”.
Jake Berry, the Tory MP and former minister, said: “There is little or no reason that people working for Cambridgeshire county council should not go back to work. We have seen Covid restrictions rolled back across the country and it beggars belief that the only place they haven’t heard about this is in Cambridgeshire.”
Steve Count, head of the Conservative group on the council, suggested its leaders were “overthinking” Covid precautions. When the HQ was commissioned by a previous Conservative-led council, the council chamber was replaced by a multi-function room that could be used for full council meetings.
However the Lib Dem-labour coalition, which took control last year, says it is not fit for purpose, and has insisted on holding council meetings elsewhere.
A spokesman for the council said it had kept essential public services running throughout the pandemic and had done so “from a range of workplaces and [settings]”.