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1,000 council staff receive notice of redundancy risk
Reporter: by Janice Barker
Date online: 06 March 2009
Letters have gone out to tell almost 1,000 Oldham Council staff they are at risk of redundancy.
A briefing note was sent round by chief executive Charlie Parker on Wednesday to almost 1,000 staff in administration, management, communications, and project management, telling them to expect a letter about redundancy.
He said: “There is the potential for there to be 267 fewer posts in these areas. The aim is that reductions will be achieved through voluntary means and expressions of interest are still being invited from people who may wish to be considered for voluntary redundancy.
“However, if your post falls within one of the areas identified your post may potentially be at risk of redundancy.
“There are about 970 staff working across these areas and, if you work in one of these areas, you will receive a letter at home to tell you that you are ‘at risk’ and to explain more.”
The council says it needs 488 redundancies in total this year, and 56 more next year, after it called in consultants KPMG as its efficiency partner.
The convenor for the GMB union, Jim McDermott, said: “This redundancy procedure is a ridiculously protracted. We started talking about this in September, and we are still waiting for the final outcomes.”
The council is also advertising for five new assistant directors at salaries of up to £100,000.
Wednesday’s Guardian newspaper carried an advertisement for five Oldham Council assistant executive directors.
Four were at salaries of up to £80,000 or more for exceptional candidates, and one, in strategic projects and investment, will be paid up to £100,000.
ACAS pay-award ruling
Oldham Council workers have been awarded a 2.75 per cent pay rise for 2008-09 by the arbitration service ACAS.
Last year, national union leaders said they wanted a pay rise of 6 per cent, and the employers offered 2.45 per cent.
There were two days of industrial action which closed schools, offices, and council services.
The ACAS award is binding and is backdated to April 1.
A joint statement by GMB and other public sector unions said: “ACAS recognised that local government workers are among the lowest paid in the public sector and they have been affected significantly by the worsening economic climate.
“We have always argued that local government workers have become the poor relations of the public sector. They have contributed enormously to improving local services and meeting council efficiency targets and they deserve a better deal.
“Cleaners, binmen, school meals workers, librarians, admin and clerical workers, teaching assistants, home care and social workers are among those covered by the award.”
Comments
Charlie seems to have a council that is dead in the water, costing too much and demoralised. I doubt that he will get more performance by threatening so many with redundancy or by paying managers so much. The Acas` award is a condemning judgement on how OMBC treats it's lowest paid workers. It is also intresting how current political leadership is in hiding over this.
Cloth has to be cut accordingly, but there's a legacy of mis-management going back over a decade that can't be reversed. Look at when they installed these super-exectutives on super-salaries, the waste of over a hundred thousand pounds on a 'branding' exercise...
The redundancies do have to be made it seems, but the travesty will be if jobs are replaced by agency staff. They get lower pay, less holidays, less sickness cover - and that's not healthy for the town.
One has to wonder were the poor services provided by unity partnership fit in this model; after all they are a private company paid at much higher rates than ombc direct staff. Remove these jokers and ombc would save enough to improves services and possibly reduce the number of redundancies.
what about the £3million wasted on KPMG to try and save money!
thats a real waste!
Letters have gone out to tell almost 1,000 Oldham Council staff they are at risk of redundancy.
Did they include the photo of Charlie boy wearing his £175,000 grin? That will soften the blow.
488 redundancies needed but as expected, the executive, empire building, merry-go-round has restarted. Did you really believe all that executive staff reduction crap? Another £500K a year, of our council TAX, for more talentless end of the roaders. We'll discover how lucky we are to get them, shortly.
Is it only me who thinks that these out of town chief execs all seem to have a smug look on their face having landed the plum job!Let's face it, it wont be long until he's off to the next council who are offering more money for messing things up!( I kept it clean!)
If Charlie hadn't wasted so much money on KPMG etc, we might still have enough money left. The jobs he talks about going are vital. Frontline services to the public will suffer with limited back office staff to support. People will start to leave when they are expected to do the jobs of one or two people because of redundancies. It won't be long before Charlie and his overpaid "mates" are on their own with no staff. Charlie says ...
My only concern is why the hell these redundancies haven't happened before?
We all know councils are overstaffed, underworked & overpaid so welcome to the real world folks.
With all their leave, & flexi-leave & no doubt countless sickies, it's high time they had a dose of reality. Staff at OMBC or any council, always seem to be moaning about their lot, whether it be pay, pensions and yet they still get pay rises, gold-plated pensions, when a lot of people in the real world dont get either
I wonder if those who received their letters in the post this morning are motivated? Rumour has it that Charlie and his senior managers recently invested few thousand pounds of the public purse on getting a 'famous' mountaineer for a motivational talk.... Maybe the chronicle should be making a freedom of information request?
Charlie & his newly-appointed babes must be among the biggest wastes of money at the moment. His smug grin is sickening ......
Have Your Say
If big time Charlie didn't spend tens of thousands on the 'much needed' decorating for his new offices perhaps jobs wouldn't need to be cut.
By Libertine @ 06/03/2009 13:01:18