Officer pay on Tory hit list
The proposal was included in Control Shift, Returning Power to Local Communities , the party’s green paper on localism launched by leader David Cameron on Tuesday.
The document confirmed plans to hold referendums on having mayors in big cities, abolish regional government in its current form and introduce a power of general competence.
As part of a bid to tackle “growing concern about uncontrolled wage inflation and severance pay among town hall chief executives”, the party will also require councils to publish full details of senior officers’ remuneration, including pensions, perks and severance packages.
The Tories will in addition provide new guidance to local authorities on the drafting of senior staff contracts. “This issue has been brought to the fore over the recent maladministration in Haringey over the ‘Baby P’ scandal,” the paper said.
“Contracts should ensure that senior staff who are dismissed for failing to perform their duties to a high standard should not be rewarded with ‘golden goodbye’ payments.”
The Society of Local Authority Chief Executives & Senior Managers , said the proposals were “out of character” with the rest of the paper.
“We are pleased to see the confidence shown in local government managers by the party in the rest of the paper but this proposal looks unnecessary to us,” said deputy director-general Mike Bennett.
A spokesman for Local Government Employers said: “We shall have to wait and see if it would mean they will issue something legally binding on ‘golden goodbyes’ or whether they will be issuing best practice guidance on contracts.”
The paper also gave details of plans to reward councils for pursuing pro-house building and business policies.
For each new home built in a council area, a Tory government would match the additional council tax raised for six years. To do this, a£1.25bn ‘matching fund’ will be set up by first abolishing the housing and planning delivery grant and then transferring£250m a year from formula grant into the fund.
Shadow local government minister Bob Neill confirmed to LGC the party had dropped plans to introduce directly elected city region mayors.
“It is an interesting argument but we felt the upheaval of another structural rearrangement weighed against it,” he said, adding that mayoral referendums had been limited to places with distinct local identities.
Asked if a Conservative government would consider bids for unitary government when they were widely supported locally, he said: “If they came forward on that basis, we would be wrong to rule that out. We won’t be going looking for it, but we will be open-minded.”
The paper was welcomed by the Local Government Association . “The green paper’s stated aim of giving more power to local councils and people is an excellent step in the right direction,” said LGA chairman Margaret Eaton (Con).
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