Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Are Haringey Council paying bonuses to Senior Managers to make cuts?
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/114135/response/281202/attach...
Your thoughts on this FOI response which states 87 Senior Managers recieved bonuses (or performance related pay) in a borough that has food banks for some in its population who cant afford food, that has had riots and has the highest unemployment in London.
Bonus well deserved?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Michael Anderson on
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It's not a bonus. A lot of staff in local government are on performance related pay (a lot of us where I work are moving to it later this year). We have pay scales, so you start your empoyment at the bottom of a pay "ladder" with four or five increments. At the moment for most staff going up an increment happens automatically, on the anniversary of your employment. The Haringey scheme (and lot of others) means that you do not move to the next increment unless your annual appraisal for the year gone shows that you have performed well. If you haven't, you stay where you are on the pay scale.
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Permalink Reply by Seema Chandwani on
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Dictionary Definition of Bonus: "An amount of money added to wages on a seasonal basis, esp. as a reward for good performance"
Local Authority Speak transulating the term Bonus: "Performance Related Pay"
I am not denying any of your points, except that Bonus and Performance Related Pay are the same thing, it is additional payment above the salary for work considered to be of good performance or above expectation. I agree, as someone who has been in Public Service for over 16yrs that it is a contract agreed at time of employment.
This is different to an annual increment, which is standard practice to ALL employees. This FOI clearly stated that only 87 Senior Managers were awarded the increment based upon achievement of targets (you have to read the link they supplied too). There were options & no doubt some Senior Managers who did not "achieve"
The targets are set annually, and someone in the council decided in times of "austersity" the performance target was to achieve the budget cut I assume this vague FOI is stating. That to me, is unpaletable. In addition, considering the state of the borough it appears the Council is rewarding based upon systems and not service delivery. What is known in management as celebrating production rather than output, in this case possibly the achievement of cuts but not on whether these were efficient to quality of services
I do not believe this is the best use of public money, I am not that interested if people in local gov are on PRP, it is bad practice to award it when the impact of services is not conducive to a satisfactory outcome to the population. Its the same as failing bankers getting bonuses,
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An annual increment was standard practice but is no longer for many staff. I don't get one unless I meet the targets set for me. If I don't my pay remains the same as it was the year before.
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And its the targets I am worried about, who is setting these (not yours) but for Haringey and deemed that they were met considering the output for 2010/2011
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But you can't have it both ways. If these staff were not on performance related pay they would get their annual increment no matter how they performed.
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Im not asking for them not to have PRP, Im questioning the reasons they achieved it, which is according to my understanding to implement cuts. If that is the case, is this sufficient? Is this in the best interests of the public purse and has quality been a factor to achieve if so, I doubt very much 87 of them would have got the PRP Bonus
Again, you are speaking about systems and I am speaking about output. As I said I am not bothered if PRP is the system used, Im bothered what the criteria is and what justifies them achieving this. The outputs for the people in Haringey have, in my opinion not justified this award.
I do not want it "both ways", I want it to be a fair way, morally ethical to public services ethos of delivering to the public.
1,000 public sector staff lost their jobs, many more thousands of people lost their vital services, people are suffering on our doorsteps and I do not expect our publically funded council to incentivise such actions and reward bad management of an already bad situation.
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I'm absolutely with you on not benefiting bad management but it wasn't Haringey who cut £80m from their funding. If the money just isn't there, what are they to do?
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Permalink Reply by Andreas Koumi on
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What are they to do? Not fork out £150k in bonuses to senior management would have been a start - if the money just isn't there.... Such bonuses are unconscionable, at a time when there's so much misery and hardship for so many in the borough.
And the cuts should have been distributed more equitably locally, across the board. Not in the manner they were.
Wasn't keeping their generous salary, pensions, entitlements enough for senior management? Cutting front line workers jobs had to be incentivised?
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Andreas, I and all other local government workers, have not had a pay rise in three years. Our salaries are worth 10% than then. Exactly how would you sort this out? There is an unpleasant tendency to heap blame on public sector workers, most of whom do jobs most people would never dream of doing.
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Michael Anderson said - Andreas, I and all other local government workers, have not had a pay rise in three years. Our salaries are worth 10% than then. Exactly how would you sort this out? There is an unpleasant tendency to heap blame on public sector workers, most of whom do jobs most people would never dream of doing.
Don't be so paranoid. Who's heaping blaming on public sector workers? It's those further up the food chain I have a problem with. You may not have had a pay rise... but still count yourself lucky, as other decent, dedicated, hardworking public servants lost their jobs and livelihoods... and then saw Tottenham go up in flames.
Don't be an apologist for the appalling decisions that have been made, first by central government then by local government. Forking out bonuses to those implementing these cuts only rubs salt in the wounds.
As for how I'd sort this out. I'd have refused to implement bad decisions and policy; so I'd never have got into a senior management position at Haringey Council in the first place. Oh, and I'd have refused the bonus.
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Hi Michael,
Im also a public sector worker and have worked in public service all my adult life (15yrs). This is no way an attack on public service workers or public services, infact it is the complete opposite.
We in the public service must ackowledge a strange business concept of management has crept in to the sector, targets based upon systems rather than outcomes for the public. Yes it is true many public sector staff have not recieved an increment, however in this case the pay reward was only offered to SENIOR STAFF.
Blame for the cuts rests firmly with Tory led policy which has an ideology to dismantle public services, however the council had a choice in how to implement these cuts. It is obvious by the 1000 plus job losses and amount of frontline services lost that those who became the victims of the cuts were frontline workers.In fact, if you look at the organisational chart of Haringey pre/post cuts the names of the Senior Managers in the main appear to be the same.
It is not rocket science that giving the scissors of cuts to senior managers would mean that they protected themselves, a conflict of interest in the process which should have had better scruntiny. To now find out that self protection was not enough, but an incentive led scheme to award Senior Managers additional pay to "make these changes" is sickening for any true believer of front line public services.
I would much rather £150k was spent on 5 - 7 front line workers to keep vital services open than to rewaard 87 senior managers who already have a salary.
The criteria on which they were awarded based on this FOI is to achieve the cuts package which included 1000 jobs, it was not to effectively seek how to protect vital services and ensure our boroughs needs were met.
Last financial year the council UNDERSPENT by what is believed to be £3m, this is the results of target driven processes as opposed to quality driven ones. £3m could have been many public sector jobs.
As an ex local authority manager, I fully understand that public sector jobs, especially on the frontline are jobs difficult, although many ex staff would dream of doing them and did them well. The council has a responsibility to have assessed what was in the best interest of the public given the circumstances and considering we have the highest unemployment in london, schools facing special measures, 24,000 on the housing waiting list, riots and members of our community now needing food handouts. It is plaining obvious to me that the council incentivised the wrong target.
The moral thought of 150 residents council tax going on senior managers rather than frontline services for the young, old, poor, disabled and vulnerable is not sitting well with me as a tax payer.
Alas, though as Haringey People told us... this £86m cut is for a "Better Haringey" and I guess I am just ungrateful and should welcome this "positive" outcome for our borough, afterall 1000 public sector workers needed to go to make us better right?
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Hi Seema. I'm curious that you have the before-cuts and after-cuts organisational charts, showing the management grades and other posts. In the past I've asked for some organograms showing this. And was told by the Dear Leader that I can come to River Park House to view them. Which is a bit silly since I have email and a PC on my desk at home.
But maybe they're on the Council's website and I've missed them. If so could you share the link here.
(Tottenham Hale ward councillor)
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