Over-management at Brent Council

One of the canards that Eric Pickles and his ilk like to put is that numerous Council officers are paid more than the Prime Ministers.  This is such an obvious distraction tactic from the Tory led government's responsibility for the Cuts programme that I am surprised people fall for it, but maybe it is worth addressing.

The first thing to say is that it is probably literaly untrue.  David Cameron gets (I believe) £142,000 per year as Prime Minister.  That job does not sufficently fill his time so he also gets paid as MP for Wirtney.  As a MP, he is also entitled to various allowances, although I dare say he no longer claims for wisteria trimming.  In addition, as Prime Minister he gets the use of Downing Street, all kinds of travel and of course the use of Chequers.  I have never hired a stately home, but I imagine it would be quite expensive.  All in all, I would think his vartious emoluments are well beyond what any local authority officer is allowed to claim.

In Brent Council, it is true that we have identified that we have more management layers than we should, but the idea that we could find more than £40 million simply be eliminating "waste" is absurd.  We currently have a staffing review specifically designed to bring our management spans to what PWC have advised us is a more appropriate level.  We have already abolished the most egragious example of bureaucracy in the Council.

This was the so-called "Business Transformation dEpartment" created by Paul Lorber to oversee efficiency changes under a highly paid officer head hunted from another authority.  Although its task was supposed to be reducing management layers, it was overloaded with expensive management staff.  Indeed the unit had more managers than it had people to manage.  Unlike the most recent budget, its abolition was not greeted with demonstrations outside the Town Hall.