More problems with recruitment and retention at the cash-strapped council as the woman tipped for top job heads for the exit. KEN LEE reports
Jenny Rowlands, who was hired in February as the council’s £166,000 per year assistant chief executive, is quitting Croydon to take up another job with the Local Government Association.
At a council increasingly noted for its “churn” of staff, Rowlands lasted two months in her role.
Churn: Jenny Rowlands has quit
It has been reported that Rowlands will take up her new position from May 11 (the week after the local elections). Rowlands has been paid more than £3,000 per week by Croydon Council.
“That was quick,” one slightly exasperated Katharine Street source said today.
“We all knew that Rowlands was hired on a short-term, interim basis. But no one imagined it would be quite so short-term.”
Rowlands was brought in at the request of Elaine Jackson, Croydon’s interim chief executive, who had been promoted into that role following the abrupt departure of her former boss, Katherine Kerswell, last October.
Jackson had been gearing up for her own retirement when Kerswell left Croydon in a bit of a rush (and £50,000 of public money better off, thanks to a golden handshake given to her by Mayor Jason Perry). Many Town Hall insiders had assumed that Jackson would stay on until a new council administration was elected, and some saw Rowlands as offering a ready-made replacement for the council’s top job.
Rowlands had previously been CEO of Camden Council in north London, where she was known for working well with its Labour administration and local MPs, such as Sir Keir Starmer.
Now, though, it appears that whoever wins the mayoral election on May 7 will be looking to recruit two new council execs (combined salaries: £375,000 per year). Unless, that is, Liberal Democrat Richard Howard wins: he’s said he’d get rid of the council CEO and other top-tier execs, and actually do the executive bit of his mayoral role if elected.
No assistance: Elaine Jackson
Rowlands’ appointment in Croydon was never formally announced by the cash-strapped council. Bringing in short-term help was also interpreted by some as an admission from Jackson that she really either wasn’t up to the job, or didn’t ever want the role. Until Kerswell arrived in crisis-hit Croydon in 2020, the council had managed to get by without an assistant CEO.
Council papers showed that Rowlands was on £165,667 – plus pension contributions (which could amount to more than £30,000 per year). Rowlands’ salary included what the council calls a “Special Occupancy Scarcity Allowance” of £7,769.
“The worrying thing to consider here is whether Rowlands has taken one look at the place, the debt and the Commissioners, and decided pretty quickly Croydon’s not the place for her,” said the Katharine Street source.
The Local Government Association only started recruiting for its own top job in March – after Rowlands accepted the position in Croydon.
Based in Westminster, the LGA is a glorified lobby group, beloved by petty bureaucrats who inhabit the nation’s town halls. Formally, it is a cross-party body for local councils in England and Wales, “to act as the unified voice of local government”.
It was the LGA which advised Croydon over the appointment of Kerswell (who, after drafting her own job description, ended up being the only interviewee for her CEO post), and it was the LGA which paid Jackson’s salary for at least her first year of working in Fisher’s Folly.
The interim CEO vacancy at the LGA has arisen because permanent chief Joanna Killian has been on leave for “personal reasons” since the end of January.
Rowlands was interviewed for the interim role this week, with the LGA announcing her appointment yesterday. She will take over an organisation that is looking to axe 10% of its workforce, and which failed to advise trade unions of the beginning of the consultation period over possible redundancies.
In a report in the trade magazine Local Government Chronicle, Rowlands said: “I am grateful for the opportunity to join the LGA at a pivotal moment in its own transformation and at a time when local government is playing an increasingly important role in shaping the future of place-based policy and public service reform.
“I look forward to building on the work already achieved by so many colleagues to ensure the LGA remains a motivated and confident membership-led organisation that is so highly valued by all.”
There was no mention of her £3,000-a-week sojourn in south London at all.
Read more: Croydon’s rewards for failure laid bare in Town Hall Rich List
Read more: Council’s agency staff bill includes £726 per hour consultant
Read more: Kerswell takes another pay-off as she quits as council’s CEO
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If piss-poor Perry took his responsibilities seriously, devoted himself full-time to running the borough instead of taking us for a ride for £86k a year, and got his Cabinet Members to do something useful, not just turn up to the odd meeting and read officers’ reports out loud and grin for the cameras (that’s you Scott Roche) we wouldn’t need so many highly paid executives
I agree 100% with this.
Executive Mayors are supposed to run the council at a strategic level setting clear priorities for the cabinet members they appoint and the non political management in their areas of responsibility and of course the councils finances.
But I’m not of the opinion that they should have Carte Blanche over appointments to the staff otherwise we end up with the US system of appointments based on politics not management skill and just making things worse.
100% agree
Another indication that Croydon is a basket-case council when even career-long Local Government gravy train freeloaders don’t stay here long, before getting a better offer, with better prospects.
Its the same everywhere in Croydon. People who are good move to locations that are good in both private and public industry but always in Public as the pay rates are the same. Why work in an area in apublic facing role where everyone is angry, the anti social behaviours and shoplifting is rife. Even walking or taking public transport to and from is dangerous. That is the legacy from the material changes of the locaism act and the huge borrowing with no consequence for the borrowers. So when one can move to the same roles with the same pay but a better environment where your work is valued.
Wonder what due diligence she did before taking the role in the first place?
It’s not like the councils trouble aren’t public. That there are commissioners would be a sign of that as would the churn of senior staff (not just top tier but those that actually run departments / major services).
Could look like a poor choice for her to take it.
I hope there isn’t a rush to fill this position. The new mayor (of whatever party) should have a chance to review the councils structure. The finance role is a different quantum of a role to this one so I can understand why the commissions moved on it.
Same due diligence that the Council finance and contract team did when vetting Regen Capital as a suitable counter party to the Red Clover Gardens fiasco🤔