At least six government agencies have only half as many desks as employees, as revealed by freedom of information requests.
Despite a government push to get civil servants to stop working from home, the Department for International Trade only has enough desk space to accommodate 22% of its staff in the office, according to new data.
In April, Cabinet Office minister Jacob Rees-Mogg urged fellow ministers to “send a clear message to civil servants in your department to ensure a swift return to the office.”
In 2022, the Admiralty Place office of the Department of International Trade had 3,151 employees and 708 desks.
The London office of the Department of Health and Social Care had only 848 desks for 2,707 employees, meaning that only 31 percent of employees could be accommodated. Since 2018, the attached workforce has nearly tripled, but only ten additional desks have been discovered.
There are 2,243 full-time employees at the Department of Education’s Great Smith Street headquarters, but only 1,100 desks are available.
Attached to the Home Office building on Marsham Street in 2021 were 2,012 desks for 4,137 employees.
On Victoria Street, the Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) has fewer than half of the desks required to accommodate all employees at their headquarters.
Rachel Hopkins, a shadow cabinet minister, stated that the numbers make a “mockery” of Jacob Rees-“useless Mogg’s head-counting exercise in the corridors of Whitehall.”
BEIS reported an increase in staff at 1 Victoria Street due to the department’s leadership role in delivering “key government commitments,” including the Vaccine Taskforce.
Other departments, such as the Northern Ireland Office and the Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, also experienced desk shortages.
The Cabinet Office refused to release the requested information, and neither the Department of Culture, Media, and Sport nor the Ministry of Defence responded.
Only the Department of Work and Pensions and the Foreign Office reported having sufficient desk space for all employees, with 2,333 desks and 2,158 employees at the former and 3,500 desks and 3,200 employees at the latter, respectively.
Nevertheless, despite the lack of office space throughout the rest of Whitehall, the government has exerted significant effort to reduce the number of civil servants who work from home.
The Deputy Prime Minister, Dominic Raab, personally examines past data to determine how many civil servants are coming to work at the Ministry of Justice, which has 2,138 desks for 4,125 employees at its Westminster office.
One of his department’s civil servants told that he “really ought to have better things to do.”
The Ministry of Justice declined to comment, but according to a source, “ministerial oversight of office attendance is not uncommon, and the MoJ is no exception.”
Before the pandemic, staff was only permitted to work in the office three days per week due to a lack of desks. While there is variation between departments in some cases, a lack of desks meant that staff could only work in the office three days per week.
Another civil servant criticized the government, stating that “trying to arbitrarily force full-time office working, which is often less effective, is quite stupid, especially considering that most offices lack adequate space.”
As a result of the pandemic, the civil service reportedly developed “extremely effective hybrid working patterns.”
Yesterday, the government issued an update regarding the number of civil servants employed by each department.
Last week, less than a quarter of Home and Foreign Office employees worked in the office.
Ms. Hopkins stated, “These numbers make a mockery of Jacob Rees-head-counting Mogg’s exercise in the corridors of Whitehall and the creepy notes he has been leaving for civil servants who are simply trying to do their jobs.”
She added, “Ministers should focus on providing real solutions to the cost of living crisis rather than blaming their employees for the government’s incompetence.”
In response to the data, a government spokesperson stated, “The prime minister and cabinet secretary have made it clear they want to see civil service office attendance consistently return to pre-pandemic levels, and we have seen significant increases in occupancy that are being closely monitored.
“The entire government agrees that face-to-face, collaborative working has clear benefits, and we know that this is particularly important for the learning and development of new and junior employees.”
In addition, the government emphasized that the use of hybrid working arrangements was not new and had existed before the pandemic.
According to them, most departments organize space based on a ratio of desks to staff that assumes not all employees will be in the office every day.
