Play fair with council workers and let chiefs take a pay cut

From: Mr K Bagot, The Terrace, Honley, Holmfirth.

are our councils run by economists? I think not. It does make one wonder in this time of austerity just how all these decisions in what to cut are made within these council cabinet meetings. Are the decisions made out of politics or economics?

Our councillors are pretty much well paid in this day and age. So are the chief executives and directors. In fact most chief executives earn more than David Cameron, who receives about £142,000 per annum for being Prime Minister.

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Chief executives in some councils earn up to £200,000 – plus their sweeteners, free leisure passes, private health care for the family, etc.

An excellent salary to have, but consider the average wage. It is £26,500. Yet the council workers, those who actually do the work such as carers, road sweepers, house repairers, only probably get the minimum wage. In truth this just is not fair!

I know efficiencies have to be made during these austere times and I believe it’s now time to play fair with all council workers.

A proposal should be put to the full council that all councillors should take a cut of say 17 per cent to their pay and expenses.

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Also a proposal should be put to the council that the chief executive and their directors also take a pay cut too until this austerity crisis is behind us.

All we ever hear from our councils is job cuts and services being cut. It would be nice for the council leaders to lead from the front and show the citizens and voters, that we are all in this together.

We the voters know these times are hard, and we are all in this together. But we’re not sure those holding power in our local councils are at all. But the real workforce that delivers the services to the public is part of this scenario, because they take all the job cuts, and we lose the services.

Sadly the days are well and truly gone when councillors took up their role because they wanted to do their civic duty and help the local communities that they live in. In those days the councillors did the job for the love of it, and held down full time employment elsewhere. The only remuneration from the council in those days was their expenses.

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These days it seems it’s just a job for some, a well remunerated job too, which some councillors still do for the right reasons, of which I appreciate.

I wonder if our local councils went back to those days of doing the job of councillor just for the expenses, how many councillors would carry on with the job?