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 Seema Chandwani on
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Emailing them to you now Mr S :)
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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Seema although we probably differ about where the blame for cuts firmly rests, I firmly agree with most else of what you've said. What has happened appears to be the opposite of what was promised.
A while ago, the head of finance (Cllr Goldberg) went on a road show to neighbourhood forums explaining that cuts would be made in the central bureauracy in order, as far as possible, to preserve ordinary workers performing front line services to the public.
Given that cuts of some sort were coming regardless, this seems to have been a sensible policy. And given the big disparity in wages and salaries between top and bottom, this seemed like a wise policy in order to preserve the largest number of jobs. (I think the ratio in councils between the most grossly overpaid and the poorest paid is more than the 20:1 ratio suggested by David Cameron some while ago).
Unfortunately, the exact opposite has happened. Senior managers seem to have acted to preserve there own positions. Has this not made the local council even more top-heavy than before? Some of these characters are on quite ridiculous salaries (and rich benefits) that they couldn't remotely expect in the real world.
Perhaps the job of deciding where the axe should fall should not have been left to those with a vested interest in the outcome.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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"Senior managers seem to have acted to preserve there own positions. Has this not made the local council even more top-heavy than before? "
Evidence, please?
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William Hoyle, before I commence how is your chairman Baroness Warsi doing? £160 a night for a room in an Acton house yet she wants to cap housing benefit to £96pw? The irony must be hard to take :)
Back to the point, if you agreed with me I'd be worried but just as predicted & hoped one of the endangered species known as the Tottenham Tories disagrees
Speaks volumes - thanks :) x
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You're so cute little willy, I feel to pat you on the head! :) Mwah!! xXx
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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on
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He is neither cute nor little. Please play the man not the ball. This WAS getting interesting, you took your own discussion off topic.
Clive made a good point: "Perhaps the job of deciding where the axe should fall should not have been left to those with a vested interest in the outcome."
But I also suggest that if the decision of where the axe should fall had been left to voters, we might have an even worse situation. Cut all the managers you like, it still doesn't add up to the savings "required".
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Back to the point, which you have diverted... Who said to sack all the managers? Who said to even have a public vote?
The Tory imposed savings did need to be made & Im not even disputing that, whether they were needed is a national debate
Back locally, we have 87 managers who have recieved bonuses or pay awards or any other term ppl wish to use to explain pay for results. What are these results? The result or achieving a cut? Or for quality outputs to the needs of the public who pay for these jobs?
I am questioning what they got the award for? In times of limited resources & high community issues was this justified? If someone agreed they get it for getting more Xmas lights, then yes it was achieved but was that a fit for purpose target?
The needs of the client should've driven the criteria, given the rise in issues in the borough, including my 'emotional claptrap' about food banks, it is my opinion that it is not!
If ppl are happy to defend 150 residents full council tax being awarded to 87 Senior Managers more fool them for the OUTCOMES we have in our borough - then thats up to them! Me, i think its disgraceful!
As for how I play Little Willy, thanks for the advice but he holds far too much comical value for me to give him up so easily! He is such a cutie... I think Im in love :) x
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For argument's sake, shall we say that each of these 87 senior managers was on a salary of £100K? So we're up at nearly £9 million in just salary for these people and so we're excluding their pension arrangements and office space/secretarial requirements. How does £150K look next to a salary budget of £8.7 million? What about one of even half that? In percentage terms it's 1% (more likely) or 3% of the total salary for those people. In businesses this is nothing, John Lewis pay out anywhere from 10% to 20% in bonuses to staff.
You're coming at it from the other end to make it seem like a big scary number and I think that's slightly disingenuous.
As for your question about whether or not they were paid to sack people and "make cuts", this the business end of managing a budget. Rather nasty but someone's got to do it, some people even have to be incentivised.
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Permalink Reply by Andreas Koumi on
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Haringey Council is not a commercial business like John Lewis. It is a local authority, paid for by the tax payer and answerable to the taxpayer. I want answers to these questions:
• Why were "bonuses" made to senior-managers, while others were losing their jobs and money was too tight to mention?
• Why - as seems to be confirmed in the weasel-worded letter - were senior managers paid a "bonus" to cull their own staff?
• Who made this decision?
• Who approved this decision?
* Why are any of them still in a job?
Perhaps the good councillor can shed some light....
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1. Depends on how you define 'good' i suppose; given the controversy surrounding how the cuts were implemented locally, and the subsequent events of last summer, my definition of good is clearly different to yours. but then, you're a Tory apparently, so that's hardly surprising.
2. They were keeping their jobs. Wasn't that incentive enough? You see, Billy, in public life, with public money, public perception is paramount. Your party chairman may be able to give you some tips on this.
3, 4 and 5. If a fish stinks, it stinks from the head, I suppose.
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Permalink Reply by StephenBln on
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Wait a minute tho'.. I don't think even the Labour party calls itself 'socialist' - It might just scrape by as being Social Democrat, but it certainly ain't socialist.. Democratic in the US meaning might be more apt.
I agree, no more yah boo sucks - so stop calling them socialist and then they might stop calling you lot 'tories' - which you aren't anymore either (thank goodness!) apart that is from Peter Tapsell.. who still likes to use the silly outdated term 'sir'
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"Haringey Council is not a commercial business like John Lewis. It is a local authority" - fair point. I'll back track a bit and call John Lewis an organisation that employs people and I used it because it has awell documented and open bonus scheme.
"Why - as seems to be confirmed in the weasel-worded letter - were senior managers paid a "bonus" to cull their own staff?" - Sometimes managers are given a percentage of any money they can save in their budgets. Sometimes they're even allowed to sack people to do it.
None of this is very nice but it's not corrupt or incompetent either, especially compared with the shit show going on at the Royal Courts of Justice.
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