Civil servants at the Office for National Statistics have escalated industrial action, instigating a zero-office attendance policy and increasing their use of work to rule.
PCS said more than 1,200 of its members in the ONS are currently taking this action, which intensified on 25 July.
The union has been in dispute with the ONS since April 2024 over changes to its hybrid-working policies and has held three statutory ballots and taken continuous industrial action since May that year. The action began as non-compliance with mandated office-attendance targets, with working to rule added in the first escalation last August.
The union has a mandate until the end of September for both strike action and action short of strike at the non-ministerial department, with 68% of its ONS members voting for the former and 91% for the latter, in a ballot that ended on 31 March, with 71% of eligible members voting. PCS has indicated it will soon reballot members to maintain its mandate.
The union's ONS branch warned a growing number of ONS staff have reported that managers were “attempting to force attendance based on wafer-thin 'business requirements' to undermine our action short of a strike that has restored working autonomy to members”.
PCS also pointed to the damning recent review of the ONS and comments last month from Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee chair Simon Hoare, who described former national statistician Sir Ian Diamond as a hybrid of “a Medici prince and Blofeld”, and senior ONS governance structures as a “boosterish chumocracy” run like a “Tudor court”.
The union said staff “will have felt vindicated and relieved, having provided a good deal of evidence to both inquiries about deep-rooted and widespread concerns that are now surfacing with the hope of things improving”.
However, it said staff will also have been “saddened to see the department’s reputation so badly damaged by these gross failures of senior management”.
PCS said the hybrid working dispute is “symptomatic of the wider issues covered by the PACAC inquiry, from the crass introduction of the new policy to ONS management’s unwillingness to engage in meaningful talks to find a resolution”.
Emma Campbell, chair of PCS’s ONS national branch, said: “The issues highlighted at PACAC have had a serious and damaging impact on industrial relations at ONS. Things are moving quickly with a new permanent secretary having now been appointed and we will continue to demand ONS work with us towards a negotiated settlement to bring this dispute to an end."
A spokesperson for the Office for National Statistics said the department is "disappointed" about the escalation but "agrees with PCS on the need to end this dispute".
"We are working hard to address pressing issues with our key statistics," the spokesperson said. "It will be a priority for our new permanent secretary to make sure all our colleagues are engaged fully in that process."
They added that "face-to-face interaction fosters collaboration, innovation and learning".