I've spend a while this morning looking for a job. Not any old job. This one - Environment and Regeneration Director at Kent County Council.
It seems the post has been filled and that doesn't surprise me. When Adam Wilkinson left the £170,000 a year job, after just 12 months in post, he was handed a £365,000 pay-off. His reason for leaving was his dislike of commuting. "I was living in Maidstone during the week and going back (to Yorkshire) at weekends," he said. "It was tiring and stressful."
Since Mr Wilkinson left Kent County Council and returned full-time to live with his family in West Yorkshire, he ran his own consultancy firm for a short time before landing another cosy number as chief executive of Derby City Council on a salary of £160,000.
Seems Mr Wilkinson took a pay cut. He certainly can afford to do so with such a tidy wee nest egg from Kent CC.
I know government cannot interfere in the pay of council officials, but I wonder if the good people of Kent know just how generously their local council is with their council tax.
They do now.
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This is the Kent that invested £50,000,000 in Icelandic banks.
It was probably the long walk from County Hall to Maidstone East Station that wore him out. Check it out on Google or MSN maps and you will see what I mean. On the other hand there just may have been a monumental budgetary disaster which we have yet to learn about.
I sit in my cell preparing for vespers. Fuming
Gildas the Scribe
Jings Demetrius, you obviously know the area well.
Maybe the stress was caused by the fact he could hear his train arriving and he was still in some boring meeting.
Yes of course FE, I temporarily forgot about that. They're still surviving of course. Makes you wonder doesn't it?
I'm sure there's more of the same with other councils gildas. This happened last year and maybe someone has now decided to blow the whistle.
I'll bet a pound to a penny there are plenty such deals going on.
And rural Suffolk County Council still fail to justify why they should pay their Chief Executive about 50% more than we pay our Prime Minister for running the entire country.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/suffolk/7398428.stm
It's long past time these salaries were controlled Joe. Central government should step in. The rubbish about 'we need to pay what the private sector would pay' is total nonsense.
Seems no-one realised how stressy the commuting might be when he took the job but, happily for him, Kent County Council were "very supportive" about his departure and were Contractually Obliged to pay him off in this way even though his early departure was his choice.
This public service nonsense has got to stop.
It has banned and it seems as if it's up to the blogosphere to shout about it. The MSM isn't exactly exploding about it is it?
There's a word, one I've using for a few years now - peculation.
Wiltshire has just become a "Unitary Authority" and handed out £5+ million in golden goodbyes. In some cases to folk who'd joined knowing their posts were of limited span.... and definitely not eligable for statutory redundancy. The weasels hid the dozen or so "lottery winners" (£250K up to 350K+) in a larger number of admin staff redundancies and refused to elaborate on how the figures were reached and who got what. Most councillors were refused access to the details.
There was a Radio 4 program ealier this year about this. It makes MPs look like amateurs.
A very accurate word to describe the behaviour of some councils Gordon. I will remember it, thanks.
We really need central government to make some hard and fast rules for councils. This waste of money can't continue.
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