Around 600 staff from Caerphilly County Borough Council braved the wind and rain Monday lunchtime to voice their anger at senior managers’ recent secret pay increases.
Local authority chief executive Anthony O’Sullivan was one of 20 senior bosses awarded pay increases at a secret meeting of five councillors in September. His salary is now believed to be around £158,000, a £35,000 increase on previously published figures. A chief officer once on £71,000 now appears, under the new pay structure, to have had an increase to more than £99,000.
Unison, which represents around 3,500 council workers in Caerphilly, organised the lunchtime protest outside council offices in Ystrad Mynach and were joined by colleagues from the GMB.
Gary Enright, Unison’s Caerphilly Branch Secretary, said: “Today we have clearly demonstrated our anger about the Chief Executive’s mammoth pay rise and that we are not prepared to simply accept the situation.
“Our clear and united message to Caerphilly Council is: we demand fairness for all and we will accept nothing less than a rescinding of this unequal and divisive decision.
“We will be taking our protest next to the ruling Labour Group meeting which will take place here, tomorrow at 5pm, where we expect to be joined by members of the general public who have been equally appalled by the council’s recent actions.”
Dominic MacAskill, Unison Cymru/Wales’ Head of Local Government, said: “The protest today has demonstrated the level of public outrage on this issue and Caerphilly Council will have to sit up and listen to our members, and the wider public, and take the necessary action to regain the staff and public’s confidence.
“People believe in fair pay for all, which requires the breaking of the three year pay freeze for all staff and not just for those at the top of the pay scale.”
Social Services worker Jane Jordan said she was protesting because the pay increase awarded to senior managers could have gone into frontline services.
She told Caerphilly Observer: “I’m absolutely disgusted at the way employees and residents have been treated. There have been so many cuts yet they’ve awarded themselves a massive pay rise.
“It’s total disrespect for people who need services.”
Another worker, who did not want to give his name, said: “It is extremely unfair. Every reason they have put forward in justifying the increase can equally be applied to other members of staff.”
Cllr Colin Mann, Plaid Cymru group leader on Caerphilly County Borough Council, attended the protest and said his party is currently discussing the best wording for a motion to call a special meeting of the council.
No Labour councillors were present at the protest. A Labour group meeting to discuss the issue is due to take place on Tuesday at 5pm.
Caerphilly County Borough Council was asked for a response, but a spokesman said the authority had no comment to make.
Unison has also written to the Minister for Local Government, Carl Sargeant, to seek his support and to ask that he publicly condemn the Chief Executive’s pay rise and that he also reviews the pay of all Chief Officers in Wales to ensure that no other divisive secretive deals have been passed by councils.
Caerphilly council today sent out notices to all Pensioner, on the benefits breadline, warning them that they will be giving each one of them less Council Tax Benefit next April, in fact, the Council warn each pensioner in the borough that they will have to pay the Council money next year from their pensions benefits.
This is an effective rise in council tax in order to recoup a shortfall in Welsh Assembly Funding, to the authority, of approx- £1.7 Million Pounds.
Well, the council can reduce the envisaged shortfall in the Council budget straightaway by £500,000, simply by setting aside this disgraceful and disproportionate increase in pay to a select few Council employees.
It is now clear from this exercise that the senior citizens of the Borough, the old age pensioners who already in many cases do not have enough money to heat their homes and eat a proper nutritious diet, are the people who will be paying for the Chief Executive and his friends pay increases.
This NEW announcement by the Caerphilly Council makes every Councillor on the Borough council who votes for these increases accountable for making the lives of every old age pensioner in the borough poorer and worse off just for the sake of inflating the income of those officers of this council who already get twenty times what a pensioner gets, this is not something Cameron and Clegg have done, but is something which rests at the feet of our Labour Council, this is something the Council leaders have to explain, if they don`t do so now they will HAVE TO DO SO in the doorstep at the next election, which I think is the Assembly Elections, I for one look forward to the explanation of this unbelievably stupid position, and, particularly how on earth they maneuvered themselves into it.
The Chief exec now gets paid more than the PM for running a small Council, he and other managers have used a wacky system whereby he employs a consultant who tells the council that he and other managers are underpaid, then the council simply coughs up, Have we really reached the point where public sector managers can give themselves massive pay rises during a supposed pay freeze, and nothing can be done?
They have quoted as the reason for the rise the need for pay parity with other councils, so now council managers think it is ok to seek out similar managers in other councils on higher pay than themselves, and then simply ask to have a pay increase and it is automatically granted, a nice upward pay spiral for managers!. SOMETHING MUST BE DONE TO STOP THIS ABUSE OF THE TAXPAYER.
Well done CCBC Staff, About time someone made a stand against these greedy Fat Cats ! Its disgusting they should be sacked!
Something that has not been mentioned is the effect on pay inflation of senior council officers which will occur if councillors do not squash these silly rises.
It works like this; Council A pays more than council B for the same post. Chief Exec of council B tells gullible councillors that he and his staff need a rise to right this outrageous situation.
Chief Exec of Council A then points out to his equally gullible councillors that he and his staff are slipping behind, pointing to the loss of differential compared to Council B wages. Council A then awards a pay rise to rectify this and the whole process begins afresh.
What happens in the real world is that private companies note that they can get cheaper labour from other EU countries and do so. Those of us who wish to continue working have to accept the poorer pay and conditions that result.
How about hiring a well qualified Chief Exec from Greece? He or she will do the job for less money than was being paid originally and this will allow those members of staff who wish to seek greener pastures to do so.
It is completely unbelievable that this self indulgent secretive pay increase can happen after all that has happened over the last 2 years, and that will continue to happen within public sector over the next few years . more legal direct action is required. It is a bit like lord patten agreeing massive pay structures for his friends in high places at the same time as telling a lot of public sector workers that their pensions will be reduced.