CROYDON IN CRISIS: Staff were told this afternoon that two of the ‘executive leadership team’ who were suspended from duty last week have quit their jobs. EXCLUSIVE by STEVEN DOWNES
Resigned: Croydon exec director Guy Van Dichele
Guy Van Dichele, Croydon’s executive director “health, well-being and adults”, and finance director Lisa Taylor have both resigned from their jobs.
The news was announced to staff at the cash-strapped council this afternoon in an internal memo from Katherine Kerswell, the borough’s interim CEO.
Van Dichele and Taylor were among the four execs to be suspended last week, pending a disciplinary process which formally got underway at a secret meeting of the appointments committee yesterday afternoon.
The suspensions were announced soon after Kerswell received the Penn Report, backed by the Local Government Association, into “possible wrong-doing” at the council in the couple of years that led to the authority going bust.
Van Dichele had worked at the council since December 2016 and held various positions in the challenging social care sector, rising to his ultimate job which in the past year had carried much of the responsibility for the council’s response to covid-19. Unlike some of his colleagues, he was regarded by Katharine Street sources as a competent manager.
Resigned: Lisa Taylor
Taylor had been in charge of the borough’s finances since January 2019, taking over after the equally surprising resignation of her erstwhile boss, Richard Simpson.
In the government’s “rapid review” of Croydon’s finances and governance, Taylor’s relative inexperience in the role was referred to in the report as perhaps one reason for a delay in issuing the Section 114 notice, effectively admitting that the council had gone bust.
As executive directors, both individuals were on six-figure salaries, with Van Dichele on a cool £215,444 (according to figures correct in 2019).
Because both Taylor and Van Dichele chose to resign, they will not be subject to the disciplinary process that apparently awaits Hazel Simmonds and Shifa Mustafa, who were also suspended from duty last week.
And because they resigned, neither Taylor nor Van Dichele seem likely to qualify for any generous pay-off.
Kerswell and Croydon Council had not responded to Inside Croydon’s request for comment by the time of publication.
Read more: CEO Kerswell gets ready to reorganise council’s senior officials
Read more: Council forced to declare itself bankrupt
Read more: Officials to investigate possible wrong-doing at council
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
Inside Croydon is a member of the Independent Community News Network- Inside Croydon works together with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism and BBC London News
- ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: Croydon was named the country’s rottenest borough in 2020 in the annual round-up of civic cock-ups in Private Eye magazine – the fourth successive year that Inside Croydon has been the source for such award-winning nominations
- Inside Croydon: 3million page views in 2020. Seen by 1.4million unique visitors
Is that it! NEXT for the rest I say. I’m sickened to read that they are ‘not likely to get a generous pay off. That all depends on what you consider is generous. I would say £1 for the bus home is generous. So does that mean without any disciplinary or deeper investigation this can all be covered up and not all come out in the wash as it should.
Maybe they decided not to hang around for a show trial run by the council that gave nearly half a million quid to their boss and still pays allowances to the councillors that agreed that crazy deal.