CROYDON IN CRISIS: ‘Transformation’ project is set to be rubber-stamped at this week’s cabinet meeting (it will be approved without anything resembling a debate). But according to council insiders, it is ‘rushed’, ‘full of risks’ and just a ‘Trojan horse’ for even more cuts to vital services
The future’s bright, the future’s robotic: plans to replace the council CEO with a robot are already well-advanced
Under Mayor Jason Perry, Croydon is aiming to become the country’s first AI-driven council, in an effort to make another £100million of savings in the next five years.
But opposition politicians have immediately flagged up serious concerns about the risks inherent at a council that struggles with routine IT functions, such as issuing motoring fines properly, effectively handing itself over to the Town Hall’s dodgy computer system.
“This plan isn’t about improving our council or fixing the finances,” said one. “It is about transforming our council from a failing council to a council that fails completely.”
One early suggestion that might have saved at least £250,000 per year was to replace Katherine Kerswell as the council’s chief executive with a robot, but this was dismissed when someone pointed out that the CEO was already robotic…
Instead of incurring the costs of having council officials actively dealing with the people the council is supposed to serve, big savings are predicted by simply equipping the public access area of Fisher’s Folly with a compooter that says “No!” to all enquiries.
Mayor Perry’s cunning plan is to go before his unquestioning colleagues at their cabinet meeting next Wednesday, when the words “transformation” and “ambition” (one of Tony “Soprano” Newman’s favourites) are expected to be vastly over-used.
“Croydon Council has set out its ambition to radically change over the next five years, saving £100million and becoming a cost-effective council,” an infinitive-splitting statement from Fisher’s Folly said, adding as an afterthought, “that always puts residents first.” Yeah, yeah…
Real cuts: Croydon Mayor Jason Perry has increased Council Tax by 21% in less than two years
They are giving this project a title, “Future Croydon”, which they say “is about fundamentally transforming and modernising council services, at an accelerated pace”. That “accelerated pace” bit might be serious cause for concern, according to Katharine Street sources.
“Harnessing new technology will help make the council more effective and efficient, so that it provides better customer care and value for every penny spent,” said the council.
Since 2021, Croydon has cut its budgets by £137million, and while Mayor Perry has hiked Council Tax by 21% in just 12 months, he is also making a further £30million of swingeing cuts in 2024-2025.
The council says: “Despite this, some of the council’s costs, such as children’s and adults social care, remain among the highest in London.”
This is where the council’s statement becomes deeply dystopian, and a bit robotic: “This is not financially sustainable for the future – and this is why the council needs radical change.”
Perry’s council statement continued by claiming that it can only achieve further cuts in spending “by becoming the most cost-efficient and effective council in London”.
The fundamental contradiction contained within the council’s plans – cutting spending yet delivering legally required care for the borough’s elderly, vulnerable, disabled and young – seems to have been ignored by Perry and Kerswell and their top team, who continue to pat themselves on the back for “good progress”, despite having handed over effective control to a government-appointed panel last year.
According to the council statement, over the next five years they intend to “improve” the council’s use of technology (it surely cannot get any worse?) “to ensure that customer interactions with the council are seamless and hassle-free”. Try not to laugh. They are serious.
“The council will also explore new ways to empower residents and partners and, through better use of technology, enable them to play an active role in their communities.”
Access Croydon: will Perry have robots installed in the foyer?
In the half-arsed statement from the cash-strapped council, piss-poor Perry said, “Our transformation plans put people first – ensuring we do a better job for our residents and customers. We’re modernising to make it easier for them to get in touch, and to have a good experience when they do.
“This is not radical – what is radical is the scale and pace at which Croydon is going to deliver the change. The council needs to get much better at some of its interactions with residents – and this starts now. Some transformation will take longer, but we will work at pace to deliver.
“Ultimately, we want to change our relationship with our residents, so that we are empowering and enabling them as much as possible.”
Council sources who attended briefings from Kerswell’s senior officials this week told Inside Croydon, “I was distinctly underwhelmed.”
They said: “As if the idea of listening to residents and then using automated technology to give them what they need is ‘new’.”
And they expressed “plenty” of continuing concerns about the council’s competence, or lack of it, over IT issues.
Another characterised the scheme as, “It is more cuts, and investment in AI so that residents will get their help from robots, not people.”
The council statement, the source said, “says they are doing this in a hurry, which risks poor AI structures where ‘The computer says “no”,’ and misspending on IT systems that don’t work.
Consistent: Cllr Claire Bonham is concerned about Perry’s plan
“The desire to be the cheapest operator may see all savings going into cutting costs, not freeing up time to help those complex cases.”
Councillor Stuart King, the leader of Labour’s Town Hall group, said, “As even Mayor Perry acknowledges, the council cannot secure or transform its future without a long-term financial deal from his Government.
“Without that deal, residents will see this plan as a Trojan horse for yet further cuts to vital services they and their families rely on.”
Claire Bonham, Croydon’s Liberal Democrat councillor, drew a similar conclusion. She told Inside Croydon: “While I welcome the need for transformation, I am concerned that what we will get are cuts by another name.
“Doing things more efficiently and listening to and meeting the needs of Croydon’s residents is of course good for everyone, but it is a legacy of Croydon’s years of dysfunction that they are striving to do what other councils already manage to do.
“I would like to see the council be much more creative in thinking about their services and particularly around how they can really harness technology to benefit all, for example the library plan does not suggest anything really radical to reform services at the heart of our community.
“For Croydon to be truly sustainable and bring about proper transformation we need the Government to step in and work to resolve Croydon’s £1.5billion of debt – without action on this then any plan to transform services is just tinkering around on the edges.”
Sceptical: Peter Underwood
Peter Underwood, the Green Party’s parliamentary candidate for Croydon East, said, “This press notice should come with a translation guide. When they say ‘savings’, they mean cuts. When they say ‘efficient’, they mean sacking more people. When they say ‘working with partners’, they mean privatisation.
“And when they say ’empowering residents’, they mean getting residents to do things for free when they’ve already paid their Council Tax and expect reasonably to get the council to do the work.
“This plan isn’t about improving our council or fixing the finances. It is about transforming our council from a failing council to a council that fails completely.”
- Read the council’s ‘Future Croydon’ plan here (it’s only 18 pages)
- Read Mayor Perry’s ‘business’ plan (it’s a little longer…)
- Click here for Katherine Kerswell’s report for this week’s council cabinet
Read more: 21% Council Tax hike but Perry has a pay rise for his mates
Read more: Here’s the Mayor and 33 Croydon Tory councillors who THREE times voted in favour of hitting you with a 15% Council Tax hike
Read more: No hiding place for Jason Perry, Croydon’s impotent Mayor
Read more: Perry pleads poverty when he has more Council Tax than ever
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ROTTEN BOROUGH AWARDS: In January 2024, Croydon was named among the country’s rottenest boroughs for a SEVENTH successive year in the annual round-up of civic cock-ups in Private Eye magazine
With the Conservative party sinking in popularity, the chances of Perry being re-elected Mayor of Croydon in 26 are slim to none. “Four more years” is not a winning slogan for someone synonymous with piss-poor performance .
His cuts aren’t about efficiency but ideology, driven by a mad desire to satisfy the whims of a government that has spent 14 years destroying public services and preaching about tax cuts while giving taxpayers’ money to their mates, e.g. £400m of contracts to a racist now being investigated by the police.
Our council’s failing record on technology includes buying the wrong traffic enforcement cameras, paying somebody a fortune for a clean streets app that didn’t work and falling for a conman who sold them smart bus shelters that didn’t exist. And let’s not forget Labour’s hacking shame and it’s compromised Anonyvoter system.
AI used to mean Artificial Insemination. With this leap in the dark, we’ll all be royally shafted
What could possibly go wrong when an organisation becomes totally dependent on the electronic management of information. Over the last few days Sainsburys & Tesco’s have been hit by electronic outrages causing chaos, but at least AI might have some benefits. A hologram of Jason Perry will be far lighter on his feet and won’t need to waste money on booking real venues when he can interact on a computer screen and speak AI generated hot air. No one will be able to tell the difference.
“Harnessing new technology”… the existing incumbents can’t even find an email sent from staff to manager internally the same day; let alone answer it. Staff can’t use their phones, few know how to file documents let alone retrieve them.
Don’t forget the farce that was CrapGemini and Crapita (2002 onwards), who routinely billed the council £250 per workstation to install Adobe Acrobat Reader; a free download.
If this is pursued we will see the same problems we have experienced with ALL technology projects at Croydon. Those buying have an ‘idea’, but don’t know what they want or anything about the technology in the first place. They will get fleeced as happens on all IT contracts by people far smarter and business savvy.
Investing in any intelligence at Croydon would be a help; it will highlight the current absence. But this investment needs to be with those running the departments to start with.
Has he been playing with one of those bullshit generators again?
“Councillor Stuart King, the leader of Labour’s Town Hall group, said, “As even Mayor Perry acknowledges, the council cannot secure or transform its future without a long-term financial deal from his Government””.
The problem with this statement is that Labour nationally are not committed to providing more funds for local government. On the contrary Rachel Reeves, Shadow Chancellor, says she intends to stick to “fiscal rules”.
That means continuation of Tory austerity, and probably even more councils going bankrupt.
I must have been mistaken as I thought we had AI installed at the council already. I thought it meant “Astonishing Incompetence”.
Note to self: must keep up with the modern phrases of today!
Replace Katherine Kerswell with a chocolate fireguard, Stephen Lawrence-Orumwense and Dave Philips with a couple of blindfolds, Heather Cheesborough with a rubber stamp, and Jane West with an abacus and we’d save millions with zero impact on public services.
I’d love to understand some examples of what this will mean.