Exclusive: Pay-off bonanza for civil servants in job axe

THE Government has spent millions of pounds paying off civil servants in Yorkshire – offering some staff at the Department for Education office in Sheffield nearly four years pay to leave.

A Yorkshire Post investigation has revealed that the Department spent 5.7m on redundancy deals for 57 staff, which included compensation packages of 100,000 or more for up to 28 people, some earning less than 30,000 a year.

There were also seven packages worth more than 200,000.

Of those who received six-figure pay-offs, the vast majority picked up deals worth at least two years salary, with only a maximum of four earning 65,000 per annum.

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The Department for Education (DfE) said the cuts to the wage bill would save millions of pounds each year and it would take less than 30 months to pay back the redundancy costs.

All payments made were under the terms of the previous Civil Service Compensation Scheme, based on pensionable pay, age at leaving and length of service.

Cabinet Officer Minister Francis Maude announced a new Civil Service Compensation Scheme agreement with five of the six civil service unions earlier this month which caps compulsory redundancy at 12 months and voluntary redundancy at 21 months.

Mr Maude said: "Throughout this process we have been committed to reaching a negotiated settlement that is affordable and gives protection to lower-paid civil servants.

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"The previous scheme was simply no longer fit for purpose and had to change.

"In today's tough economic climate, we would be failing in our duty to the tax-paying public if we had allowed its excesses, which saw some employees walking away with packages worth more than six years pay, to continue."

In 2009-10, the DfE, which was then the Department for Children, Schools and Families, spent 23.1m on releasing 187 people across the country.

A spokeswoman said that as a result of "increasingly limited redeployment opportunities and the need to further reduce our head count" the voluntary releases were offered on compulsory terms and were therefore more expensive – an average of 126,000 per person.

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They also included the release of more senior managers, including the Senior Civil Service in order to meet a target to reduce the number of SCS staff by 20 per cent.

Since 2006, the DfE has spent 13.4m cutting staff from its Sheffield office. There are now 467 staff remaining and 16 have recently been accepted for voluntary redundancy.

The spokeswoman said the changes were as a result of the findings of the Gershon Review – the review of public sector efficiency conducted in 2004-05 by Sir Peter Gershon – and could not say whether there would be any further reductions in staff.

She said: "As a direct result of the findings contained in the Gershon Review, the department was required to reduce its headcount by over 30 per cent between April 2006 and March 2008.

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"In 2006-07 the Department spent 12.5m on releasing 193 people, at an average cost of 65,000 per person, and in

2007-08 spent 8.1m on releasing 110 people, at an average cost of 73,000 per person."

She added: "As with any organisation committed to avoiding compulsory redundancy, the staff who left went on voluntary, flexible terms, meaning the department could fund these releases at a considerably lower cost to the public purse.

"In 2008-09, the department spent 6.6m on releasing 94 staff at an average cost of 70,000 per person.

"In 2009-10, the Department spent 23.1m on releasing 187 people. This was a continuation of the department's restructuring and transformation programme."