Ernie Clark. Hilperton Division, Wiltshire Council.

Wiltshire Council is revising its policies.

Wiltshire Council is revising its policies following independent reports into severance arrangements of the former district councils and county council and the payment of non pensionable honoraria payments.

We are told that the move from five councils to one has resulted in major savings and a leaner, cost effective authority providing high quality services at low cost and that restructuring has reduced the workforce by 159 posts saving £5.5 million a year and will save £17 million over the next five years. The posts made redundant as a consequence of the transition to one council resulted in a one-off cost of £5.2 million.

As part of the commitment to open and transparent working, the council commissioned its external auditors KPMG to look at severance payments by all five councils and the payment of non pensionable honoraria made by one of the former councils. A task group has been set up to implement the recommendations made by the auditors.

The former councils had severance policies that were significantly different which would have made it difficult to manage appointments and redundancies. Following consultation with the trade unions, the Wiltshire County Council Implementation Executive recommended that the five councils adopt a single harmonised policy to ensure consistency and to facilitate the transfer to unitary status. This was in line with guidance from central government (DCLG).

The KPMG audit found some differences in the way the severance arrangements were implemented by the five councils. This reflected their different interpretations of the relevant statutory provisions. The auditors identified arithmetic errors across the former councils resulting in under payments of £3,600 and over payments of £32,900. Steps are in hand to recover the over payments.