Health bosses spending up to £400k to help civil servants work from home – after building of 18 new hospitals delayed
HEALTH chiefs are to spend nearly £400,000 on equipment for staff to work from home.
The Department of Health and Social Care has ordered two years’ worth of “monitors, keyboards, desks, and chairs”.
It comes after critics’ warnings that remote working is damaging the UK.
Government data shows that a quarter of DHSC office space was already unoccupied last year.
Details of the deal are revealed in a contract with German office supplies firm Mercateo.
It will cost a maximum of £386,380 but could be less. And it is understood that all items will go to desk-based civil servants — not doctors and nurses.
This week former M&S boss Lord Stuart Rose said WFH was contributing to the economy’s “general decline”.
Many major employers including Amazon, Boots and JP Morgan have been stepping up the pressure on staff to spend more time in the office.
But last Monday Health Secretary Wes Streeting put on hold the building of 18 hospitals — saying they were “undeliverable and unaffordable.”
They were committed to in 2019 — but some now are not due to begin construction until 2032 or 2035.
The DHSC was contacted for comment.