E.59/17
It was
noted that the following public questions had been received from Mr
Rick Gaehl:
Question 1: The stated cost to SHDC of the 'One
Council' consultation is £12,828, but this figure does not
appear to include any staff costs. Can the Committee discover and
confirm:
a)
details and costs of work by Council
staff on the merger?
b)
details and costs of any new staff
required to work on the merger?
In
response, the Leader advised that the costs of the consultation
exercise were reported to the Overview and Scrutiny Panel on 12
October, 2017. This was for the
website, postcards, telephone survey and events. In addition to these costs, a further £4,000
was spent on advice on council tax equalisation and £6,188
was spent on project officer time.
These costs are the South Hams share only of the costs. Council officers are not required to complete time
sheets or to time-record. The projects
that Council officers were involved in were all part of their
everyday role and duties which were set out in their job
descriptions. The Council employed
officers to carry out these roles e.g.
Strategic projects.
Question 2: Council reports indicated the merger
would save SHDC £0.5M pa from "staff efficiency reductions"
and that these would affect 'less than 10 [staff] roles'. Can the
Committee confirm the affected roles, how they would have been
affected and the salaries of those roles?
In
response, the Leader advised that by removing the complexities
inherent in serving two Councils; a single Council would have had a
less complex and costly administration.
Becoming
One Council would have meant releasing some capacity absorbed by
serving two bodies. This would have
reduced the amount of time spent on complex or duplicated
processes. Financial systems would be
simpler, with single reporting requirements and a removal of the
complexities of recharging money between both Councils and the need
for two sets of Accounts and reconciliations (such as bank
reconciliation, control account reconciliations, shared service
reconciliations).
The main
areas of duplication were in finance, case management (support
services), senior management team, democratic services and areas
such as elections. The staff efficiency
reductions were anticipated to generate £370,000 of savings
per annum. It was not felt appropriate
to specify individual roles and salaries as it was hoped that the
reduction in posts could have been largely addressed through
natural turnover in these areas.
In addition
to these savings, savings from having one financial ledger
(£25,000) and a reduction in subscriptions/memberships and
audit fees would have saved another £60,000. Further savings of £85,000 per annum were
also projected from a 20% reduction in Members.
Question 3: Officers reportedly had 'severe concerns
over the future financial stability' of SHDC if the merger did not
occur. Is the Committee able to confirm:
a)
predicted deficits for 2018/19, 2019/20
and beyond 2020/21?;
b)
how the Council proposes to
reorganise?;
c)
how the merger would have avoided
deficits?;
d)
if there is any plan for a Council Tax
referendum?
In
response, the Leader advised that:
a)
For SHDC the Council had put forward proposals for a
balanced budget in 2018/19 as set out in the Executive report of 1
February, 2018, which was a legal requirement. The predicted deficits are £639,000 in
2019/20 and £561,000 in 2020/21 – a total of
£1.2million.
b)
Tough decisions would need to be made on reducing
service provision. The budget report
for 2018/19 made clear that a decision needed to be made on public
conveniences for example in the 2019/20 budget. The Council would be examining other ways to
generate more income and be more commercial. Through the joint waste procurement, there would
be options for Members regarding the frequency of waste collection
in the future e.g. Three weekly, options
for optimising the trade waste service, alongside other options
such as charging for garden waste. The
Council’s asset portfolio was being reviewed and options were
being drafted for Members as to potential future
opportunities. The Council was working
in partnership with Eastbourne Borough Council on innovative option
appraisals and development opportunities as to how the Council
could optimise its asset base.
c)
The Single Council would have realised over
£0.5million per year from staffing and other efficiencies
plus increased council tax income of £2.5million per year (by
the end of the equalisation period) which would have contributed
towards the funding gap and improving valued services, providing a
strong resilient financial base. A
single asset strategy for the Single Council would have been
produced, to maximise assets across the whole area of South Hams
and West Devon. Longer term savings
could have been delivered from a future decision to operate from
one main office for example. There
would have been an opportunity to derive savings from new contracts
and systems requirements when the dual arrangements were replaced
by cheaper single contractual relationships.
d)
No. The current proposal
is to increase council tax by £5 for 2018/19, as set out in
the Executive report of 1 February 2018.
Question 4: Given that the financial case presented
in the consultation and other briefings was apparently unanswerable
why does this Committee think:
a)
so many South Hams residents objected to
the merger proposal?;
b)
West Devon councillors rejected the merger proposal?
In
response, the Leader advised that over 80,000 residents did not
respond, so clearly they were the silent majority.
Question 5: Do members of this Committee believe that
the embarrassing public failure of this merger, which wasted
considerable public funds, means the current Council leader Mr
Tucker should stand down?
(At this
point the Leader left the room).
The Deputy
Leader then gave the following response:
This
authority is facing unprecedented financial pressures. We are all aware of the need to meet these
pressures and I am enormously privileged to work alongside a Leader
that puts this authority before political gain. Our Transformation 18 Programme places us the envy
of a great many local authorities. I do
not consider the outcome of the consultation as embarrassing,
disappointing maybe. However, we do
know through that consultation, on the whole, our residents are
happy with the services provided by this authority. So to sum up my answer – a very firm
No.
(Upon the
conclusion of the response, the Leader returned to the
meeting).
Question 6: Is this Committee aware that the web
pages containing the procedure for submitting public questions at
Executive and other committee meetings do not contain either an
email address to which one should submit questions or a telephone
number for member services? Will the committee direct that these
web pages are updated to contain relevant email addresses and
telephone numbers?
In response, the Leader advised that the Executive
was aware that a number of the ‘How You Can Get
Involved’ pages on the Council website did not contain
relevant contact details up until recently. This was an unfortunate consequence of a number of
webpages being transferred from an old to a new website towards the
end of last year and had now been rectified.