A TEMPORARY worker for Wokingham Borough Council is being paid almost £900 per day – almost double the salary of chief executive Andy Couldrick.
And another interim staff member for the council has been paid £780 per day for a role they have been in for the past three years.
A Freedom of Information request submitted to the council reveals that there are at least 10 interim staff members on the payroll earning more than £550 per day, at a time when the council needs to save £19 million due to central Government funding cuts.
The figures, say Liberal Democrat councillor Clive Jones, “are costing the council an absolute fortune”.
The Freedom of Information request asked Wokingham Borough Council (WBC) to provide a list of the top 10 highest-paid interim staff as of the end of January. The council was asked to include the daily rate, the position and the length of time in the post.
Although interim staff are meant to be in place as a temporary measure, some have been in the role for half-a-year or longer, with the longest serving interim staff member being the AD for Learning and Achievement, who will have been in the post for three years when they leave WBC at the end of the month.
Other long servers include the interim head of highways on £600 per day for the past 10 months, a Service Manager for Corporate Parenting, on £586.91 per day for the past nine months and an Interim Head of Finance on £708.42 for the past seven months.
By comparison, Wokingham Borough Council employs 62 staff members on salaries between £50,000 and £90,000 on a full-time basis.
The request also noted that not all staff work on a full-time basis, but did not give details as to who was full- or part-time.
High costs
Defending the figures Cllr Anthony Pollock, executive member for economic development and finance, said: “We commission through national frameworks, and we negotiate keen rates, but the cost of some of these posts, filling senior roles, is high. The same situation applies to other authorities; and often we have difficulty in recruiting to some of these vital roles and have little choice but to appoint interims.”
He added that WBC was currently taking part in a massive cost cutting exercise called 21st Century Council with the aim of saving £19 million. There will be redundancies as part of the programme.
“Our far-reaching programme will make a significant contribution to our three-year savings plan and we will become a leaner, more efficient council costing significantly less to run,” he explained. ”The programme will generate £4 million staff savings every year. Since 2014 we have saved £2 million through reducing the number of leadership roles in the councils and doing things differently.
“Planning for the programme’s implementation started some 18 months ago. It’s a period of significant change for the council, so it’s important not to recruit permanently to roles if we are unsure they will continue in the future following our reorganisation. The posts currently occupied on an interim basis will either disappear once the programme is fully implemented or will be subject to permanent recruitment, at the right time.
“Our programme is ambitious and we’ve also brought in extra capacity to help us make changes we needed. But we expect our reliance on agency staff to reduce once we have fully implemented the 21st Century Council programme. In other areas, such as social work, we have seen real success in increasing permanent staff to Wokingham Borough Council and reducing our reliance on interims.”
Three-year placement coming to an end
And with regards to the three-year stint of the Learning and Achievement AD, Cllr Pollock said that the contract was coming to an end this month but indicated that another interim appointment could be made.
He said: “When the post first became vacant two rounds of recruitment were undertaken, neither producing a suitably skilled and experienced candidate for the role.
“Since then, there have been significant changes in the way the Government is funding schools, and the local authorities statutory duties with regard to its role as the Local Education Authority, for which this role is responsible.
“We did not recruit permanently as we were waiting for the impact of these changes.
“The current interim leaves on 31 March 2017 and we’re currently considering the most suitable arrangements bearing in mind that the way forward for local authorities and academies is still unclear.”
‘This shouldn’t be happening’
Cllr Clive Jones, Liberal Democrat councillor for Hawkedon ward, questioned the large wage bill.
He said: “This shouldn’t be happening. It’s costing the council an absolute fortune. Why are we spending so much money on so few people?
“It’s hard to justify these payments as we go through the 21st Century Council process.
“People could have kept their posts, or extra money could have gone on adult social care, or schools.
“I’d like to see regular appointments made as soon as possible and become normal council employees, not paid via private companies and agencies.
“There should definitely be more transparency from the council over this.”
It’s a ‘hammer blow’ says Labour
And Labour councillor, Andy Croy said that he was shocked by the figures, calling it a hammer blow for staff.
He said: “Everyone has the right to maximise their earnings but it is not the job of
the Wokingham Borough Council to facilitate this and nor do council tax payers expect to subsidise this.
“The news will be a hammer blow to many staff at the council who face retrenchment as Wokingham’s Tories impose austerity on the council.
“Our schools are screaming for extra cash. Our lollipop ladies face the axe. The only people who get more cash are the councillors who voted themselves a pay rise.
“It is a clear failure of leadership at the top of the council.
“Keith Baker has failed to get a grip of the situation and should resign.”
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