CONSERVATIVES voted to ignore a recommendation from industry experts to carry on paying themselves extra allowances – while being accused of greed by the opposition.
At the same time, the councillors agreed to give themselves a 1% increase – just £66 a year – in their basic allowance.
In the named vote – where councillors were called one by one to indicate for or against a motion – there were 22 votes for, but 12 against and 14 abstentions.
They were voting at the meeting of Wokingham Borough Council of Thursday, November 17, based on the view of their Independent Remuneration Panel (IRP).
The group, headed by chairman David Jones, said they have looked at the allowances in the context of other local councils.
Councillors are currently allowed a basic allowance, based on expectation that the elected members give 50% of their time on a pro bono basis. Members are allowed to claim out of pocket expenses, an allowance and a separate allowance to go towards the cost of computers.
Recommendations
It is this that the panel agreed should be increased by 1%, in line with the same increase that council officers have received. It will be backdated to April and mean that a councillor’s basic allowance will now be £7,618 per year.
The IRP also recommended that special responsibility allowances (SRAs) should be limited to just one per councillor. These are payments made for sitting on panels or outside bodies and Wokingham councillors are allowed to receive more than one SRA – but the IRP concluded that 65% of other councils of similar size only permitted Members to receive one payment.
In their report, they recommended: “From the evidence received, the Panel recommends that Wokingham Borough Council move to a system of one SRA or Non-Executive Director payment per Member for both Executive and Non-Executive Members, being the one with the highest value, from the appointment of new positions in May 2017 to bring the Council in line with other local authorities.”
Mr Jones told council: “Our job is to assess the market view. We’ve thought long and hard about this and recommend it to you.”
However, Cllr Keith Baker, the leader of the Conservatives, said that Wokingham’s situation could not be compared directly to the other councils as others paid more in basic allowances.
“As always, the devil is in the detail,” he said.
“Therefore, on balance, I recommend that council does not accept this recommendation.”
Cllr Baker said that the councillors should accept the panel’s advice elsewhere on allowance increases.
Ferris: expenses request ‘smacks of greed’
In an angry exchange, Liberal Democrat leader Lindsay Ferris told the chamber that he felt Cllr Baker’s comments about other councils were irrelevant.
He added: “I was not going to speak on this topic other than to thank the IRP members for their conscientious hard work. The proposal to change Recommendation 3 is an utter disgrace.
“It smacks of a leadership wanting to keep areas of responsibility to a small core of people.
“And secondly it smacks of greed. Greed on the back of residents of the borough.
“We shall be voting against this proposal and as you are aware wish for a named vote on this particular item.”
The result of the vote saw the Conservatives motion passed, but, adding the abstentions with those against, more people chose not to support it than voted for it.
To read the panel’s report, click here.
