PRESS RELEASE
It has emerged that Labour-run Rhondda Cynon Taff Council, which last week claimed it was facing financial ‘Armageddon’ following cuts of 3.3% to its budget, spent over £3million on redundancy payments to staff last year, including £631,000 to five top executives.
The payments were supposedly to make savings, yet the council’s total workforce actually rose.
Commenting on the reports, Janet Finch-Saunders AM, Shadow Minister for Local Government, said:
“It’s a bit rich for a Council, which claimed cuts left it facing an ‘armageddon scenario’ to now be exposed frittering away over £600,000 on pay offs to just five senior executives.
“These redundancy payments and others totalled over £3million and were supposedly to make savings, yet the council’s total payroll actually increased.
“Hard-pressed taxpayers will be appalled to see another Labour-run Council bunging bumper payoffs to top bureaucrats with taxpayers’ money at the same time as considering cuts to libraries and other frontline services.
“This is yet more evidence of the need for a review of senior executive pay in Welsh local authorities.
“The Chief Executive role in RCT Council commands a salary on a par with the Prime Minister, all paid for with the council taxes of hardworking people.
“It is time we had a full and frank review of senior pay in Welsh councils, which hard-pressed taxpayers will see as excessive, wasteful and worthy of savings to protect funding for frontline services.”
ENDS
Notes
News of the £126,200 payments to five senior executives was published in today’s Western Mail: http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/five-senior-officers-one-welsh-6249942
The leader of RCT Council said on 22 October 2013 that local government in Wales was facing an ‘Armageddon scenario’: http://www.rctcbc.gov.uk/en/news/archive/2013/october/uk-austerity-measures-force-tough-decisions-.aspx
It follows the announcement from the Welsh Labour Government that RCT Council was facing a budget reduction in 2014/15 of 3.3%, below the Wales average cut of 3.5%. Source: Welsh Government Provisional Local Government Settlement 2014/15.