Unconvincing: Croydon CEO Katherine Kerswell
Croydon Mayor Jason Perry and the council CEO who tells him what to do, Katherine Kerswell, had better be very worried, as a series of public opinion questions have had responses in which more than 90% of iC readers have firmly rejected the findings of a report by some of their old chums.
Inside Croydon reported earlier this month on the somewhat credulous findings of the LGA Corporate Peer Challenge, the latest report to be published into the workings of Croydon’s cash-strapped and dysfunctional council.
At one point, the Peer Review claimed:
“Together the Mayor and chief executive are well-respected and provide strong, visible leadership to the council.”
We asked our readers whether they agreed or disagreed with this Peer Review statement.
91.55%
of readers said that they disagreed with that statement.
Kerswell was parachuted into the top job at Croydon in late 2020, on the suggestion of the Local Government Association, where her husband, Barry Quirk – a former council chief exec in Lewisham and Kensington and Chelsea – is now a senior consultant.
In 2021, Kerswell was confirmed as Croydon’s chief executive, when she was the only interviewee for the position.
Kerswell, 63, has a £200,000 salary from Croydon Council, the latest of a series of local authority jobs which she has worked since she graduated from Leicester University five decades ago.
It might be reasonable to assume that Croydon could be Kerswell’s last full-time role in local government. She may have hoped that the Peer Review from the LGA will have helped to polish up her reputation, after almost five years in Croydon that has been plagued by three Section 114 notices – effectively admission that the council had gone bankrupt – the imposition by government of an “improvement” panel to oversee her work, and a series of controversial investigations into the authority’s previous mismanagement.
Immediately prior to working at Croydon, Kerswell had presided over Nottingham City Council, mostly working from home, her £1.2million house in Blackheath. Nottingham is also now on Whitehall’s naughty step of cash-strapped councils.
Perhaps most notorious in Kerswell’s career was her (brief) time at Tory-run Kent County Council, where she walked away with a £420,000 “golden handshake” after just 16 months in the job. Sound familiar?
Kerswell was on a £200,000 salary at Kent CCC.
At Kent, Kerswell was in charge of something called the “Change to Keep Succeeding” plan, which she introduced to make £340million of cuts, and 1,500 staff to be made redudant in four years. Sound familiar?
In Croydon, the LGA Peer Review team spent all of four days at Fisher’s Folly last October, after which its top recommendation was to improve the council’s publicity.
Nowhere in the 36-page report was there a specific mention of the council’s budget-busting £20million-plus overspend this financial year. Nor is the £83million overspend predicted for 2025-2026 mentioned, both firmly on Kerswell and Mayor Perry’s watch.
Perry has tried to claim that the Peer Review “provides external independent validation”.
The Croydon public, or at least Inside Croydon readers, disagree.
In one section, the report reads:
“Members of the [Corporate Management Team] operate well together as a cohesive and supportive body, and are highly thought of internally and by external partners.”
94.23%
of Inside Croydon readers, some of whom may well work at Croydon Council, said that they disagreed with the LGA’s statement.
Mayor Perry and Kerswell were so keen on the LGA Peer Review that they devoted an entire council cabinet meeting to wallow in its adulation. The LGA report also said, “The council has clearly made significant progress and is responding to the issues flagged and there is now stable leadership across the organisation.”
This is the same Croydon Council which last year had one of the highest number of complaints about it upheld by the Local Government Ombudsman.
The Peer Review also reported this:
“Generally residents and local people are not yet seeing a lot of tangible evidence of improvement and delivery externally.”
So we asked Inside Croydon’s readers: agree or disagree?
This time,
91.03%
said that they agreed that they are not seeing a lot of tangible evidence of improvement or delivery.
Now this is by no means a scientific piece of polling data. It is a reflection of the views of Inside Croydon readers.
Although Katherine Kerswell, or maybe it is Mayor Perry, must have a load of friends living in Romania, or Japan, or the Netherlands, or the United States, or Spain, or even in New Zealand. Because we noticed unusual voting patterns coming from those territories, even though Inside Croydon has next to no readers in those countries.
How very odd.
But it may not be as odd as the year-long university course that the then Kathy Kerswell-Reid undertook in the mid-1990s, all paid from local Council Tax, after a bit of a fuss at Leicester City Council.
A report, in the respected Local Government Chronicle, dated October 1995, states: “Leicester City Council’s ruling Labour group is bitterly split over leader Stewart [sic] Foster’s friendship with an officer reported the Mail on Sunday.”
The LGC helpfully provided a page reference: Page 6.
“The paper said that the officer, Kathy Kerswell-Reid, has risen from junior personnel officer to head of the policy unit in under two years.
“She has now been sent on a paid one-year university course, the paper claims.” Which is nice.
Stuart Foster, who became Leicester’s council leader in 1994, was gone from the role within around a year of the LGC report.
Croydon’s Mayor Jason Perry, who promised to “fix the finances” and “open Purley Pool”, among other things, will be seeking re-election in 2026.
Read more: ‘Mayor and CEO are respected and provide strong leadership’
Read more: IT’S OFFICIAL: Croydon still among country’s worst councils
Read more: Fresh shame for council in 4 ‘severe maladministration’ cases
Read more: Criticism of Kerswell’s election count ‘justified’ says report
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