Government and council offices in Aberystwyth and Aberaeron could be wasting millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money as about 80 per cent of desk capacity is unused because staff work from home.

The Welsh Government, which offers a similar ‘hybrid working’ regime as Ceredigion County Council, spent nearly £1.4 million just to keep its Canolfan Rheidol office building open in 2022, a series of Freedom of Information requests have revealed.

Each in-use desk in the block costs about £35,000 in public funds per year because only 40 of 287 available desks have been used per day so far between January and May 2023. In 2019, 177 staff on average used the offices.

Ex-county council candidate David Inshaw – a Llanrhystud resident who has a background in infrastructure project management – fears the costs of maintaining the ‘almost identical’ block operated by the council could be very similar.

Parts of the £15m shared Canolfan Rheidol complex will be given over temporarily to Hywel Dda University Health Board for outpatient physiotherapy clinics, the council has announced, while it develops a longer-term plan for the space.

The complex built in 2009 saw many of the council’s departments brought under one roof after they were previously in separate offices across Aberystwyth.

But since the pandemic, hybrid working arrangements have been in place and trials are set to last until next year - more than two years after the end of Covid­-19 restrictions.

Mr Inshaw’s enquiries have found that, across the authority’s Canolfan Rheidol office block and the Penmorfa county council headquarters in Aberaeron, there is an available capacity of 420 desks for working council staff – but only 112 are functional and in use.

Yet the council’s desk occupancy rates show only about 80 staff members work at the offices per day, leaving a possible 340 desk spaces unused, which equates to roughly 80 per cent on average per day.

The FoI states there is a total capacity for 320 desks in Canolfan Rheidol and a maximum of 100 in Penmorfa.

Mr Inshaw was astounded at the level of waste at a time when the local authority is operating against a budget shortfall of £12m – and in February imposed a 7.3 per cent council tax hike, one of the highest in the country.

He said: “It appears that across these three offices there are more than 700 desks available but only, on average, 110 are being used.

“Which means every day well over 500 desks are sat idle and not used – whilst costing over £3m a year, based on Welsh Government figures, just to keep the buildings open.

“An obvious option is the two council offices could be closed and staff relocated to the Welsh Government office in Canolfan Rheidol – there would still be at least 150 desks available for other services.

“Work from home in a hybrid solution works when it is managed and controlled properly – with data and scrutiny to properly monitor that it’s delivering against what it’s expected to do.

“They say working from home has brought benefits and it appears to me one of those is you now have a significant amount of space that could be amalgamated, and you could release significant savings amid budgetary challenges.”

He also took issue with Plaid Cymru council leader Cllr Bryan Davies, who said hybrid working had brought about ‘benefits including increased productivity’, but struggled to give a single concrete piece of evidence that a service had boosted productivity after questioning.

Mr Inshaw described the process of getting answers to his Freedom of Information requests from the county council as ‘tortuous’.

He received an apology in April after his initial contact last December from the council’s complaints and freedom of information manager who acknowledged his request wasn’t answered properly ‘in accordance with the legislation’.

Mr Inshaw says he finally received a response which answered his questions in May - more than five months after his initial request.

The FoI also revealed that in April, no third parties or other agencies occupied any of the desks.

It also shows the rate of email sending has shot up by nearly 80 per cent since staff began working from home but there has been no increase in receiving calls.

Mr Inshaw said he wrote to all west Wales regional MSs, Ceredigion MS Elin Jones, the council leader and two of his relevant Cabinet members to share his concerns. But three weeks later, he still hasn’t received a reply – apart from Labour MS Eluned Morgan, who completely evaded the issue, he said.