16 September (Part 2) - Pleading poverty but doing OK thank you very much
There
has been a pay freeze at Bexley council for four years, there has been in many
places, but Bexley’s top brass appears to be getting restless. (See document extract.)
My heart bleeds, it must be hard to get by on something between ten and twenty
thousand a month and I am glad to note that “there is no evidence at this stage that recruitment and retention has been
significantly affected amongst Hay graded employees as a result of nil pay
awards”. Hence the recommendation by Bexley council’s senior staff to
continue to cap the salaries of Bexley council’s senior staff in 2013/14. “In view of the
Council’s on-going financial position and the requirement to continue to deliver
very challenging expenditure reductions as detailed under the Council’s Strategy
2014 Programme, a nil salary award is recommended by the Management Board for
Hay graded employees for 2012/13.”
All fine and dandy and publicly available information. What has actually been happening?
For that we must fast forward to the yet to be published 2012/13 accounts.
The pension contribution paid as a percentage of salary has gone up quite nicely
for all four Directors. A couple of thousand extra in your pension pot is not to
be sneezed at. Lots of people would be glad of a contribution like that as their
annual salary. I wonder what the new salaries are.
Well the Chief Executive’s didn’t move at all between 2011/12 and 2013/13. Neither did Peter Ellershaw’s
(Environment and Wellbeing). Same for Paul Moore (Customer and Corporate Services).
Mark Charters (Education and Social Care) got a £3,169 leg up and and Mike Ellsmore
(Finance and Resources) did even better with an extra £5,175 (†). Not bad going for
people on a pay freeze and preparing the ground for that to change.
Strange that a flat rate percentage pension contribution has resulted in all round Director
level increases without all of them seeing pay increases. But thank goodness they all
got an extra something, otherwise Bexley might not be able to “retain excellent
staff who we need to deliver the significant challenges ahead”. It’d be a shame
if Bexley was no longer able to hit the headlines for
most expensive child care,
poor child care
or leaving
old ladies to die; all because it stopped paying very nearly the highest public authority salaries in the country.
Note: Excluded from the salaries listed is ‘Benefits in Kind’
ranging from an extra £1,262 to £10,621 each. Also Mr. Ellsmore’s ‘Emergency payment’
of (†) £8,823, paid in 2011/12 but not in 2012/13.
The figures shown are not yet publicly available. Hence no links. The last time
Bexley council updated its website to reflect current senior staff payments was
January 2012. Maybe they aren’t happy to trumpet the truth too loudly.
Example shown. Click for original page.