Agenda item

A report on Early Departures and Redundancy Costs was presented.  It was noted that the report provided annual information and analysis as previously requested.

Members’ attention was drawn to key points (Para 3.4) that provide reference to the reasons that early departures and redundancies arise in line with the Protection of Employment Policy such as end of grant funding for posts and restructuring and also exceptional circumstances where employment is terminated under a settlement agreement.  

It was advised that the Accounts disclosure note is included in Appendix 1 and further analysis is provided in the tables in the report.

It was confirmed that considerable amounts are paid out as redundancy payments reflecting the current pressures in local government, however the actual amounts paid out 2015/16 compared with 14/15 were less.  It was confirmed that in July 2016, a review of reserves was undertaken that highlighted the depletion of reserves in recent years.  In respect of the Pensions and Redundancy reserve it was highlighted that there was a need for better workforce planning as already identified in the WAO Corporate Assessment, to redeploy where possible and to ensure clear cost savings from the removal of posts.

A Member queried how many Teaching Assistant posts had been lost during the last year noting that 80% of redundancies are women speculating that there could be a trend of lower paid women losing jobs.  It was confirmed that information on Teaching Assistants will be provided to Members. With regard to the gender breakdown, it was explained that Appendix 2 confirms that the majority of redundancies are female and on lower grade posts. It was agreed that a high proportion of the workforce, especially lower paid postholders, are female and that a further breakdown of the proportion of redundancies in the workforce and grades would be provided.

A Member queried the trend of redundancy/early departure costs for 16/17 year.  The Member also queried the 6 figure salary banded redundancies and asked for further information.  It was clarified that these were the actual salaries of those who had been made redundant (not including NI etc.) and did not accord with the payments made.  It was added that there are now upper thresholds to payments capped at £95,000 and agreed that there are limited numbers of staff on 6 figure salaries applicable to the Chief Executive and Headteachers of schools.

In response to a Member’s query it was confirmed that redundancy payments are subject to enhancement by a multiplier of 1.7 of the statutory amount in line with many other authorities in Wales and the rest of the United Kingdom.  This multiplier has been reduced in recent years as a result of the challenging financial climate.

It was asked that the gender balance information requested was breakdown by directorate.

Additional information was provided that the Month 6 monitoring report includes an estimation that redundancy costs for the year will be £690,000 excluding schools based staff.  It was also explained that in the statement of accounts the calculation of a redundancy payment includes how long the employee has worked for the organisation plus the multiplier which may produce a payment that exceeds the annual salary.

The Officer was thanked for the report.