170 jobs set to go in Hull City Council shake-up
ABOUT 170 jobs are set to go at Hull City Council as part of a back office shake-up.
The move to radically overhaul administrative duties at the authority is expected to be approved by senior councillors next week.
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Changes: The Guildhall
Today one senior officer said compulsory redundancies could not be ruled out.
Brendan Arnold, the council's director of resources, said: "Our hope is that we can deal with this without having to resort to compulsory redundancies.
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"However, it cannot be ruled out at this stage.
"All staff will have been briefed by the middle of the week on the proposals.
"We aim to look after the staff and support them the best we can in what will undoubtedly be a very challenging time for them."
The proposals aim to save the council about £5.6m a year by reducing the number of full-time posts in the authority's resources directorate from 735 to 564.
They range from jobs in finance and personnel to support services and ICT.
Mr Arnold said fewer staff would be needed because of a switch to computer-based working instead of relying on traditional paper-based systems.
"In the outside world, more people are doing business electronically, whether it's shopping or buying other services," he said.
"The council is no different in needing to adapt to the way it carries out its business.
"Our business processes have grown over the years under many different managers and leaderships.
"Because many of them have changed incrementally, what might have been efficient 20 or 25 five years ago is not necessarily efficient today. This is an attempt to sort that out."
Mr Arnold said the savings were also aimed at protecting the council's frontline services.
"This is happening against the background of a budget shortfall being faced by the council and the uncertainty over the local government settlement.
"These proposals will result is a much more efficient less costly resources directorate providing much better quality support to frontline services."
Originally, it had been thought up to 240 jobs were facing the axe in the directorate.
But Mr Arnold said the figure would be "around 170" depending on further detailed work finalising the new-look staffing structure.
He said consultancy work on the project by finance experts Deloitte would be worth the £1.1m fee expected to be paid to the firm.
"Deloitte is our implementation partner on this project and they bring a wide range of skills which are not available within the council to deliver this," he said.
"If we end up paying Deloitte £1.1m to help us achieve year-on-year savings of £5.6m, I would say that represents considerable value for money for both the council and, ultimately, the taxpayer."
Comments
by NeilTheasby
Thursday, November 22 2012, 1:33AM
“Deloitte to receive £1.1m to manage the "restructuring"? And they say that we have no native vultures in England! The cuts that all northern councils are having to make would not be necessary if we simply pulled out of the vastly expensive and pointless "war on terror" in Afghanistan and also stopped subsidising the weaker EU nations - like Romania, Latvia and Scotland.”
by GCtheDJ
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 10:50PM
“EEEEEK! Flossy!!!!!”
by Dex01hull
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 9:27PM
“by propforward08Wednesday, November 21 2012, 9:43AM
Try this link. Sound familiar?
http://tinyurl.com/6pd7sr
""Mr Arnold said fewer staff would be needed because of a switch to computer-based working instead of relying on traditional paper-based systems".
Just Google the words "Brendan Arnold Birmingham" and have a look at his previous attemps!!! Not to successful were they Brendan?"”
by Dex01hull
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 9:09PM
“Can someone ask Mr Brady or Mr Arnold how much money the council has spent and continues to spend paying Stockport Council to administer housing benefit claims over the past two years? Surely this has to stop rather than council staff losing their jobs.”
by MOGRAT
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 7:21PM
“by Yorci
"Instead of the council axing jobs in order to save money, have they thought of installing solar panels on all their buildings?"
No, because they are clowns.”
by AstynomiaKats
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 6:55PM
“I see Darryl os following his usual format of wheeling out lesser execs to deliver bad news whilst pocketing his £292,000 per annum, at least that is what he was getting - since no one has announced his salary since getting the new contract we don't know. How much in expenses has he claimed since taking up the job and how much did it cost to pay off the former CEO Ms Yates?”
by localvoice
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 6:10PM
“Once again can I remind you that you promised to cut senior management and now we see this is the first cut to other staff.”
by deanog734
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 5:33PM
“Contact Yorki solar panels ltd”
by PeeScooper
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 3:05PM
“Northcliffe don't give a **** unless you say something that might give them a big legal bill.”
by Yorci
Wednesday, November 21 2012, 2:57PM
“Instead of the council axing jobs in order to save money, have they thought of installing solar panels on all their buildings, whilst it won't meet all their electricity needs, it would certainly seriously offset some of their expenditure in their electricity bill. In addition to reducing the city's carbon footprint, it would help meet the government's non fossil fuel target, plus it is likely to create some additional local employment and help the local economy, albeit the employment may be temporary, the job prospects could be extended, especially if Mr Grove and Humberside Police did the same with all of its buildings, instead of intending to spend millions of tax payers pounds on building a new police station, it would even have some change left over to refurbish unused and old buildings. Any additional electricity could be sold to the national grid, thereby acting as income generation for the council and the police and that income could be used to offset their burden on the tax payer.”