Council Excellence Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Wirral Council) 17th November 2011 Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Severance and Organisational Change Part 2

Chris Hyams introduced the report (agenda item 16) on Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Redundancy and Organisational Change. She talked about the changes and remodelling as well as the Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Severance process. Chris Hyams referred to the savings and number of employees as well as the £2 million for remodelling. She said that the £2 … Continue reading “Council Excellence Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Wirral Council) 17th November 2011 Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Severance and Organisational Change Part 2”

Chris Hyams introduced the report (agenda item 16) on Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Redundancy and Organisational Change.

She talked about the changes and remodelling as well as the Early Voluntary Retirement/Voluntary Severance process. Chris Hyams referred to the savings and number of employees as well as the £2 million for remodelling. She said that the £2 million was to support management and remodelling of services delivered. She said that departments made bids to the Strategic Change Programme Board for new posts or to add money to existing posts (such as changing them to a higher grade post).

Cllr Alan Brighouse (Vice-Chair) arrives.

Chris Hyams referred to paragraph 5 and the issue of people on part-time hours or subject to a job share. She said they had deleted 719 FTE equivalent posts, which equated to 765 FTE posts deleted. Chris Hyams said it was a “work in progress”, as the information had to go on the system and be signed off.

She said paragraph 6 dealt with refilled posts, where people had been moved into a post. This had been part of the decision-making where people had been allowed to leave. If they had a person they couldn’t lose, another person would be “bumped” into a post. This didn’t lead to a 100% saving, but could be 80% or 70% as the person moving posts led to a saving in the post they left behind. She said this was complicated and referred to the 104 new posts. People had been asked to leave because of the restructure, but there was a “one bump rule” which allowed another post to be saved. The bumps exception was Metro in the Children and Young People’s Department.

Council Excellence Overview and Scrutiny Committee – 31/1/2011 Part 6 – Strategic Change Programme update (continued)

Mr Green answered that he was very confident. Regarding the status across all project, the project manager had signed off as had the Chief Officer. In addition so had the Director of Finance and the SCP office. He said analysts had gone through, so had accountants and it had been signed off by all parties. The only caveat was being realistic and honest. He said there will be ups and downs. For example the £200,000 PACSPE saving might be £210,000 or £240,000. There was a reason behind the cautious approach. If brought forward some projects would bring added savings which might add up to more than £10.75 million.

Cllr Phil Davies referred to appendix C (the DASS transformation programme highlighting the two largest savings which totalled £7 million. He asked for the confidence that these two Social Services savings will be met.

Mr. Green replied that it was the same as before. Projects had been signed off and they had made sure there was no double counting as a result of the EVR. One reason why the market management project could fail would be if suppliers didn’t accept the new price.

Cllr Green said from he had years of experience in being told they would do things and then were not able to. The previous track record had been quite considerable amounts of savings. The work required discipline and analysts. The Director of Finance had spoken with DASS regarding how realistic the figures are. For example there were no amounts for assistive technology. Asking questions realised benefits over and above the savings that were originally claimed. Where things change they were keeping a record as to why and what so it could be tracked back.