Five-job civil servant admits being contracted to work 183 hours a week was ‘impossible’ – given there are only 168 in seven days
Kashim Chowdhury, a 55-year-old civil servant accused of holding overlapping jobs across government departments, told Southwark Crown Court that working his contracted 183 hours a week was impossible. He said managers had agreed to arrangements focused on completing tasks rather than recording set hours; the case centres on whether he concealed his other jobs to receive multiple salaries.
The court heard that Chowdhury earned £349,378 across roles between February 2020 and September 2023, including posts at the Food Standards Agency, the Home Office and the Department for Business and Trade. For part of 2022, he also held jobs with Tower Hamlets Council, Defra and an NHS trust, with combined contracted hours of 110 a week. He said the work was output-based and that evidence of flexible arrangements had been lost; he accepted that holding several full-time jobs was contractually unacceptable but denied it was dishonest.
In short
- Chowdhury says working 183 contracted hours a week was impossible.
- He earned £349,378 across overlapping public-sector roles.
- He says managers agreed to flexible, output-based working.
Steelman: both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Chowdhury’s account could support the view that the headline figure overstated the hours he was actually expected to work: he says managers agreed that he would be judged by completed tasks, with flexibility over when he worked. If those arrangements were genuine and he delivered the required work, holding several roles would not by itself establish that he meant to deceive his employers.
The case against
The employers’ case is that accepting several full-time posts and salaries while concealing the overlap could amount to deliberate dishonesty, regardless of whether the contracted hours were literally workable. Chowdhury accepted that holding multiple full-time jobs breached contractual rules, and the court may consider whether the number of roles, the disclosure expected and the work delivered support his claim that managers approved the arrangements.
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