ANDREA JENKYNS
How the council are spending your money

I invited Eric to meet with Leeds City and Wakefield Metropolitan councillors today after it was brought to my attention the way in which tax payers money has been spent by the councils.

Leeds City Council
These include;
Trade Union Conveners – Total budget for these staff including accommodation costs is £505k.

Back Office Agency Spend – The Council spent over £2.6m on agency staff for non-frontline services in 2013/14.

Staff overtime payments – Staff overtime payments totalled £9.2m last year. There is also a provision for £2.6m on shift allowances, which will likely include Saturday and evening working.

Trade Union Meetings – At the end of November 2013, a total of 186.5 days were recorded as Union days plus 143 days for the full time Union learn secondment. Extrapolating this forward this equates to 279.5 for Union days and 214.5 for the Union learn secondment for the year. In refuse the additional staff cost per day of covering a crew that is not available is around £458.

Leeds and Partners Expenses – Chief Executive of Leeds and Partners spent £8,340 on expenses for a trip, including a five-star-hotel and flights to Boston. A further £16,500 was spent on two trips sending delegates to the same city. (Reported in Daily Mail, July 2013).

New website – In 2011 the Council spent £1.8 million on a new council website.

Consultants – In children’s services there have been cases of consultants being paid as much as £600 per day as consultants.

Wakefield Metropolitan Council
These include;
Trade Union Conveners Spent £227,000 per year on union reps.
Management Consultants £1.2 million per year on outside management consultants.
Pay Rise Gave a Labour committee chairman over 300% pay rise.

Both councils have raised council tax by 1.99% and Leeds City Council have raised council rents by 6%.
Surely such money should be spent on front line services, do taxpayers really want their money spent on council officers five star trips, or would then prefer it to be spent on local services.
Please let me know your views.