CROYDON IN CRISIS: ‘History,’ said Marx (Karl, not Groucho), ‘repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as farce.’ At our cash-strapped council, we appear to have arrived at the farcical stage.
EXCLUSIVE by STEVEN DOWNES

Empire-building: council CEO Katherine Kerswell

How good is your “story-telling”? £50,000 per year good?

If so, Croydon’s cash-strapped council has just the job for you!

Croydon Council doesn’t want truth tellers. They want storytellers.

While the Town Hall Chamber tonight will be witness to much gnashing of teeth, wailing from Mayor Jason Perry about the authority’s “toxic debt” and how our council needs to “tighten its belt” (or other typically unimaginative clichés), Katherine Kerswell, the £192,000 per year council chief exec, is out recruiting for experienced internal communications execs, on very decent-looking salaries. All paid for out of your Council Tax.

Did we mention that Mayor Perry will have increased your Council Tax by 21% in less than two years if he, and Kerswell, get their way at tonight’s meeting?

Because there’s an overwhelming appearance, based on observations from council staff and other Katharine Street sources that the cuts that have been made have been made in all the wrong places.

For more than three years, ever since the first Section 114 notice in November 2020 admitting the borough was effectively bankrupt, the talk coming out of Fisher’s Folly has been all about the need for hundreds of redundancies, of vacancies not being filled and, above all else, reducing the services the council provides to the public.

‘Dysfunctional’: job cuts at Fisher’s Folly have barely touched the executive suites…

Yet official figures obtained by Inside Croydon through Freedom of Information requests show that Kerswell has made only a modest reduction in the council’s overall headcount.

And she has actually increased the number of six-figure-salaried  “execs” and “directors” who share the lofty reaches of the seventh floor of Fisher’s Folly with her.

We asked for a breakdown of the number of “directors” (those commonly paid at least £90,000 per year), “executive directors” (often on salaries of £150,000-plus) and for the total number of staff on the payroll for each year from 2019, when Jo “Negreedy” Negrini was running Croydon as if it was her own giant set of Lego.

The council figures show:

• Mar 2019: 20 directors; 4 exec directors; 3293 staff (CEO: Negrini/Leader: Newman)
• Mar 2020: 20 dirs; 5 exec dirs; 3570 staff (Negrini/Newman)
• Mar 2021: 17 dirs; 5 exec dirs; 3363 staff (Kerswell/Ali)
• Mar 2022: 17 dirs; 9 exec dirs; 3238 staff (Kerswell/Ali)
• Apr 2023: 15 dirs; 7 exec dirs; 3203 staff (Kerswell/Mayor: Perry)

Most of the job cuts that have come over the last three turbulent years at the cash-strapped council (367 in total, representing a 10% cut in staff, if you take it from “Peak Negrini”, in March 2020) have been to frontline staff.

Yet by last spring, Kerswell had managed to surround herself with 22 directors and executive directors – just two fewer than when empire-builder Negrini was in charge. Very much a case of: “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss”.

Since her appointment in late 2020, Kerswell has even had a deputy CEO at the council, a position that never existed even under Negrini. According to the council’s own figures, this never-previously-necessary position pays between £143,551 and £149,270 per year.

And in the past 12 months, with Tory Jason Perry as Mayor, Kerswell’s recruitment binge has been allowed to gather pace.

New post: Elaine Jackson, Kerswell’s deputy CEO

According to one of the reports in the mountain of paperwork going to tonight’s Town Hall budget meeting, in addition to her deputy Elaine Jackson, Kerswell now has provision for five “corporate directors” (the CEO had a “reorganisation” and changed many of the previous job titles to something much less meaningful), all paid £151,131 to £160,147.

Then there are five “directors” (public health; chief digital officer; adult social care; children’s services; planning and “sustainable regeneration”) on £122,803 to £127,684.

Plus, there are 11 more “directors” (including housing management; legal services; director of education): these are all on £112,195 to £116,648.

But wait. We’re not done yet.

There are three more on £100,000-plus: a “director of policy, programmes and performance”, a “director of culture and community safety” and a “director of transformation”. These are on £101,778 to £105,820. Except the council report tells us that the transformer “has a market supplement of £17,180. The total salary including market supplement, is £123,000”. Which is nice.

In all, that makes a possible 26 staff at cash-strapped Croydon Council who are on £100,000 per year or more.

That is more than Jo Negrini ever managed in her spendthrift final years in charge of Croydon.

Taking the lowest amount payable on each pay band, according to this latest council report the potential total bill each year in salaries for these two dozen or so council executives – not including any expenses, bonuses or the very generous pension contributions – is now at least £3.3million.

Perhaps most remarkably of all, all of these senior appointments will have been approved by Tony McArdle and his committee of Whitehall commissioners who were appointed by the government three years ago as an “improvement” panel, to ensure that our dysfunctional local authority was getting things under control.

Increasingly, questions are being asked as to what McArdle and his colleagues, all of them on £900 to £1,000 per day, are actually doing for their publicly-funded fees.

Making the grades: a report to tonight’s budget meeting shows council CEO’s recruitment drive allows for 26 director level-plus employees on £100,000 per year or more

So it is, as Inside Croydon reported last month, that Kerswell has been out recruiting – using an expensive outside agency to do so, too – for a “director of customer experience and technology”, one of those senior director-level roles (Grade 3 on Town Hall pay scales, at £122,803 to £127,684).

Perhaps the person ultimately appointed to this job is exactly what our local authority, burdened by £1.4billion of debt, really needs. You’d hope so. Not that there’s been a peep of dissent from any of our elected representatives, red or blue (Greens and LibDems don’t get allowed anywhere near the secretive, Part B agendas of the appointments committee…).

Of course, there are essential council jobs, with vacancies arising that will need to be filled. Recruitment at Croydon is not straightforward. Let’s face it, what ambitious or capable young local government official is going to be lured to work at basket-case Croydon, which doesn’t even offer inner London weighting?

Croydon had a recruitment problem long before it went bust, as was shown by the churn of agency workers expensively employed, especially as social workers in children’s and adult social care.

But a look a little way down the council’s recruitment list, at more modest salaries, reveals what appears to show that Kerswell is not the only council figure who is indulging themselves at public expense.

Cushty: one of the council’s recently advertised comms job

One job recently posted is for a “senior communications officer – Housing”, a Grade 12 post offering £47,040 to £49,083.

The word salad in the job ad includes all the usual adjectives: “enthusiastic”, “passion”, “communities”, all in an effort “to support us as we improve housing services across the board”.

Yes, this is the same local authority housing department that was pilloried on national television for the way it neglected dozens of tenants trapped in unhealthy and dangerous council flats in Regina Road…

“Croydon is making huge changes in housing,” the job ad says. “We’ve made some good progress, but there is more to be done. We want to keep them, and all our staff and partners, informed and involved in the changes we are making, every step of the way.

“That’s where you’ll come in…”.

Apparently, Croydon’s next recruit will be “an excellent communicator, you’ll be skilled in storytelling and narrative, experienced in planning and managing campaigns and confident in media relations…. looking for new, creative ways to make an impact”.

Closing date, if you’re interested, is midnight on Sunday.

Perhaps if that’s too much of a stretch, how about a nice little part-time job, working 25 hours a week on internal comms for Fisher’s Folly? That means, acting as a kind of council spin doctor, getting the “messaging” right for what’s left of the council’s staff.

“If you are passionate about company culture, employer branding, staff voice and developing new digital channels, then this is a great opportunity to join us and help lead the workforce through this change…

Word salad: is Alan Partridge writing the council’s recruitment ads?

“From pitching podcasts and working on wellbeing initiatives to running equality campaigns – there’s lots on offer.”

The council says that it is “looking for a people person who will help share Croydon’s story, celebrate our staff and help facilitate employee engagement in a post-pandemic workplace”. Steve Coogan couldn’t have written an Alan Partridge script much better…

This is a Grade 11 position, paying whatever 25 hours a week’s worth of £44,019 to £46,041 might be. The bad news, though, is that this is not the first time that Croydon Council has had to go to the time, trouble and expense to advertise the position: “Previous applicants need not apply”, the job ad warns.

Wonder whether, as a test exercise for their internal comms storyteller, the council’s HR department will ask applicants to spin their way out of a situation where the bankrupt borough is paying £3.3million a year to just 26 members of staff?

• • Seeing is believing: take a look at the council’s chief officers pay policy report, going to tonight’s budget meeting

Read more: Kerswell looks to hire £127k director of ‘customer experience’
Read more: Kerswell’s council keeps payments to top earners secret
Read more: Criticism of Kerswell’s election count ‘justified’ says report

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