Staffordshire County Council News

Pay Modernisation - a Stealth Tax too far?

One could ask why, in an age when pay awards are being carefully watched, local government employees should be apparently singled out for special treatment. If Mr or Mrs (or Miss) Employee applied for a job, knowing what the offer was on the table and happy to accept the contract and its accompanying conditions, then what business is it of the Government, or anyone else for that matter, to renegotiate the salary of that job? If you or I visit a used car lot and, having surveyed the offers, choose to purchase a “nice little runner” for £5,000, we do not expect the Government to come along after and inform us that the price was wrong and we had to pay an extra £1,000. Nor do we expect them to tell the dealer to give us £500 back because he had charged us too much! We liked the car, we liked the deal, we had a choice and we chose it. Similarly, Mr or Mrs (or Miss) Employee wanted the job, wanted the pay, had a choice and took it.

However, in 1997 the Government legislated that equal pay should be implemented. This meant that in all areas of local government, job evaluation should take place, and that those employees who were not being paid in line with their positions should have their pay reviewed. On the face of it, a very obvious and simple task, and one with which there could not, nor should not, be any argument. Indeed, if Staffordshire had implemented pay modernisation in 1997, it would have cost around £10M and the ongoing cost of the payroll would have risen accordingly.

But the Labour administration of Staffordshire County Council decided to “wait and see” in the hope that the Labour Government would “bale them out”. They didn’t, and the latest proposals are going to cost the taxpayers of Staffordshire over £100,000,000. This equates to an increase in individual Council Tax bills of around £300 per household.

When Staffordshire County Council published their first proposals for what they have new re-dubbed “Pay Modernisation”, there was an outcry within the ranks. Some employees would be facing pay cuts of up to £10,000 per year whilst the more lucky ones would be in line for increases. County Hall was besieged by protests. County Councillors of all persuasion were accosted, even though, of course, it was the Labour Administration who had created, and would make all the decisions on, their proposals. And they had now set employee against employee, winners against losers. So they were sent back to the drawing board in an attempt to come up with a more acceptable solution, a solution which would satisfy over 30,000 employees and the unions.

They did this, and the results have given us the figures mentioned. Whether they add £300 per household to the tax bills, or make hundreds of employees redundant to make savings, or borrow the money, this is going the cost the taxpayers one way or the other.

 You could also ask why, if the authority can make substantial head-count savings to cover these costs and still operate the services, why did they not make these savings anyway and save the taxpayers of Staffordshire facing a year on year increase of up to 5%. Why, if they knew in 1997 they had to make this review, why have they increased the head count year by year for every year they have been in power. Are they going to blame it all on government legislation? That, by the way, is a Labour Government. This is a Labour Administration. I would suggest that it’s the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing but, as they’re both Labour, we should say it’s the left hand not knowing what the left hand is doing!

And why are the costs so high? Well, a great part of the costs arise because the implementation of the awards is accompanied by back pay. Yes, you read that right. Because the authority has delayed so long, those who have been awarded an increase are entitled to have it back-dated and Staffordshire have agreed to back-date it four years. So if Mr or Mrs (or Miss) Employee has been awarded an increase of £2500 per year, a one-off back pay award of £10,000 will accompany it.

But before they jump with joy over this “lottery win”, consider that, unlike a lottery win, these awards will be taxed and so the Government will take up to 40% of that £10,000. That means that, in some cases, of the £300 the council tax payer puts in, £120 goes straight to the Government. Nice trick Mr Brown!

And what about “the losers”? There are still people who will be up to £10,000 a year worse off. But the administration has agreed to protect them for three years. That is, their pay won’t be reduced for three years. Effectively, that means they’ve got up to three years to find a job elsewhere and in the meantime Staffordshire council tax payers will look after them at full pay. These are either people who were being overpaid for what they were doing, or they are people whose job has been unjustly devalued, and the County will lose them. Bear in mind that, if they were being overpaid, it was someone at the County who decided to overpay them. By ten thousand pounds a year?

Finally, don’t ignore schools. Even though this legislation doesn’t include teachers, it does affect all other staff and schools have been warned to put aside some of their budget for the last three years. Some have, some haven’t. For those who have, this means that for the last three years money which should have been spent on the education of our children (buying materials, refurbishing laboratories, paying for classroom assistants) hasn’t, and the children have done without. For those who haven’t put enough aside there will have to be redundancies, there will be no more money from the County and class sizes will get even bigger.

What price Education, Education, Education now?

County Farms

It can be very difficult for young people, often without any prior means, to break into farming as a living. County farms are a means by which a few of them can do so. Farms (from 60 acres or so, up to a couple of hundred acres) can be let from the authority to enable a start to be made.

Often, having been successful in obtaining such a farm, the farmer will sink all his savings into the additional equipment he or she needs to build the farm into a viable business. Many tens of thousands of pounds can be invested into the hardware necessary to make a piece of land into a working farm.

There is obviously a short supply of such farms as they are always oversubscribed. So it is amazing that the Labour Administration at Staffordshire County Council is considering the sale of these farms, both land and buildings, in an attempt to liquidise the assets. It is interesting to note, however, that all but two of these farms are in the divisions of Conservative County Councillors, so maybe it’s not so surprising that Labour should see them as easy targets.

Conservatives at all level, however, see them as an essential route for the young farmers of the future to gain a foothold and I think of them as the technology parks of the farming industry.

An additional fear in the minds of all who live in rural communities is that the land, if granted planning permission for housing, could be worth many, many millions of pounds which would ease the much troubled coffers of the current administration and this might be influencing the decision of people who should know better.

This matter was considered at a special meeting of the Corporate Policy Scrutiny and Performance Committee held at 10.00 on Thursday 6th September because 4 members of the Conservative group have "called in" the decision which was to be put to cabinet. Because of the intervention, the decision has now been referred back to scrutiny and a working group will be set up.