This snippet comes from the NDDC website:

“All North Devon Council offices will be closed from 2pm on Christmas Eve until Monday 5 January. Due to some major IT works during that period, the council website will be unavailable and we won’t be able to send or receive emails. Some online serviceswill still be available and in a genuine council-related emergency, you can call our emergency out of office number on 01271 388240.”

I don’t know about you, but I expect public services like the District Council to be working over the Christmas period.  I’m also astounded that they are having major IT works done then – I believe that they are relocating their central computer system from the Civic Centre to another of their offices. When I worked for BT all such work was embargoed over the Christmas period because if there were any problems they were far more difficult to get fixed.