Council officers given exit packages totalling £665k

Two departing senior officers will cost Bath and North East Somerset Council more than £665,000 between them in 2017/18 and 2018/19. The strategic directors for resources and place had salaries of more than £120,000 each but both are being made redundant as the authority restructures its senior management team to make longterm savings. Around 300 more jobs are set to go over the next two years. On top of the six-figure salary, the strategic director for resources Andrew Pate is set to receive £136,162 in compensation for losing his job, plus an employer pension contribution of £164,496 and some expenses and benefits in kind - a total of £424,250 over the two years. The council will compensate the strategic director for place Louise Fradd to the tune of £91,557 for losing her job, and has made an employer pension contribution £27,542. The total, along with the salary, comes to £241,531. The compensation payments are being paid in the current financial year. A B&NES Council spokesman said the reduction and restructuring of its senior management team had already resulted in a saving of £750,000 a year. He said: “The budget report outlined in February that there would be a reduction of approximately 300 posts over the next two years, with £7.1million savings expected this year alone, with an allowance of £3.5 million made for redundancies. “As part of this, two strategic director posts were made redundant and the total figure referred to includes the salaries paid for both post holders for 2017/18 when they were fulfilling their contractual duties, as well as the separately identified employer contribution to pensions which form a part of the total employment cost. “It also includes the payments made in 2018/19 to both post holders for compensation for the loss of office in line with national employment legislation. “These individual decisions were properly made by the restructuring implementation committee on March 5, 2018.” B&NES Council agreed exit packages with 93 individuals in 2017/18, totalling £3,786,040.