New Cheshire West and Chester Council seeks more job losses

Jun 18 2009 Chester Chronicle

MORE redundancies are being made at the new Cheshire West and Chester Council in anticipation of tight settlements for local government over coming years.

Chief executive Steve Robinson is seeking an unidentified number of voluntary redundancies but told staff in an email that he is working on a compulsory redundancy policy “in case this is not possible”.

Two hundred voluntary redundancies took place during the formation of the new council but Mr Robinson always said that was “not the end of it”.

He told staff in the email: “Work is currently underway with Heads of Service to refine structures across the organisation and as part of this process we will shortly be introducing a second programme of targeted redundancies.

“This will be the last time we are able to offer redundancy on these terms, which equates to twice the statutory rate.

“We hope to be able to invite applications for voluntary redundancy and early retirement in July once the final service structures have been confirmed and I will, of course, be in touch with more details once they are available. We would aim to allow as many people as possible who are taking voluntary redundancy to be released by 30 September.”

Mr Robinson said there was “a need to move forward with a compulsory redundancy policy”in case numbers could not be achieved through voluntary means or redeployment.

Council leader Mike Jones said more than 300 employees had previously expressed an interest in leaving the organisation but it was not clear how many job losses there would be.

He said: “The numbers have yet to be sorted out. We are still going through the structures, redefining the structures. We anticipate by the end of July we will have a good idea where we are looking for redundancies.”

Cllr Jones said job losses were likely to be drawn from the “support services and management side of things”.

Ray McHale of Cheshire Unison said the latest job cuts were expected and acknowledged those who took redundancy last time received “good packages”.

“We will have to see how it works out on the ground when it comes to running services,” added Mr McHale.

“Probably the most concerning thing is they are not sure they will be able to make all the savings by voluntary means.”