£10 million pay offs funded by the taxpayer

Between them the four Black Country authorities and Staffordshire County Council paid out £9.88m in redundancy payments to 363 workers in 2020-21.

It marked 22 per cent fall in the number of staff laid off from the previous year, with redundancy payments reduced by 55 per cent in figures that are likely to have been impacted by the pandemic.

The figure comes amid warnings that council job cuts were likely to continue as successive governments had not prioritised local authority spending.

The majority of councils have seen significant reductions to staff numbers over the past decade, although the cuts slowed in the past year due to them focusing on the pandemic.

New data from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) shows that Sandwell Council spent £2.6m on redundancy packages for 79 employees, while Walsall Council laid off 88 staff at a cost of £2.1m.

Staffordshire County Council and Wolverhampton Council each paid out £2.3m in redundancy payments, to 44 staff and 83 staff respectively.

The average cost of exit packages in Staffordshire last year was one of the highest in the country at £51,491. Meanwhile Dudley Council, which made £583,000 in redundancy payments to 69 staff, had one of the lowest, at £7,801.

How the figures break down:

The total value of exit packages nationally more than halved from £544m in 2016-17 to £252m last year in real terms.

No end in sight for job losses 'until councils get better deal'

There will be no end to local government job cuts until ministers start to prioritise the sector, council chiefs today warned.

Local authorities across the region have slashed their workforces over the past decade in a bid to make savings, resulting in millions of pounds being forked out in redundancy payments.

Ian Miller, secretary of the Association of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers (ALACE), said councils were continuing to reduce their workforces due to government budget cuts.

“Job cuts will continue because local government has not been a priority for this or previous governments,” added Mr Miller, who is chief executive of Wyre Forest District Council.

At Dudley Council, staff numbers including school workers have fallen in the last five years from 7,953 to 6,276 – a drop of 21 per cent.

And bosses said more redundancies could follow in 2021-22.

Councillor Shaun Keasey, cabinet member for HR, said: “There are a number of service reviews currently ongoing which may result in a small number of redundancies in the current financial year.

“However, I must stress no final decisions have been made, and the council would always seek to find employees different roles within the authority first.”

Staffordshire County Council has reduced its workforce by 14 per cent over the last five years to 3,930, while operating costs have been slashed by £270m over 10 years in a bid to balance the books.

Ian Parry, the council’s finance chief, said there were “no deliberate plans for redundancy across the authority”.

“Like all large organisations there are often parts of our services which are undergoing necessary change and improvement that could lead to some restructuring, which may affect the number of jobs available,” he added.

“This is essential to ensure that the council delivers its services as efficiently and effectively as possible and I believe is what local residents expect.”

The headcount at Walsall Council, excluding education, has dropped by 10 per cent to 3,079 over five years.

In Wolverhampton staff numbers have dropped by two per cent in five years to 3,397. A spokesman for the council said: “The council’s medium term financial position remains extremely challenging, but compulsory redundancy is always an absolute last resort and the council does everything possible to avoid this scenario through alternatives such as redeployment and offering a voluntary redundancy scheme.”

A spokesman for Sandwell Council said they had not been made aware of any planned redundancies.

The Local Government Association (LGA) said its survey of councils indicated that many were planning redundancies because of funding shortages and local government reorganisation.

It said council restructures tend to be focused on removing senior posts, which means older, longer-serving and higher paid staff are often the ones affected – and these workers are also more likely to volunteer for redundancy.

An LGA spokesman said: “Councils are required to ensure termination payments are fair, proportionate, lawful and provide value for money for the taxpayer.”

The MHCLG said councils are best placed to make decisions, but that the Government is still committed to tackling excessive exit payments. A spokeswoman added: “Severance pay is the responsibility of individual councils and we urge them to ensure that payments reflect value for money to the taxpayers who fund them.” Since the start of the pandemic the Government has provided more than £4 billion in extra funding to councils.