Librarian pay-offs stay secret
‘£120,000’ redundancies
Published: 8 April 2010
by CHARLOTTE CHAMBERS
TOWN Hall chiefs have refused to reveal the redundancy packages handed to five librarians who left their jobs at the same time.
The decision to keep the information under wraps comes as Town Hall rumours suggest that at least two of the recent redundancy payments were worth around £120,000.
The New Journal requested the details under the Freedom of Information Act, but Camden Council’s libraries chief Mike Clarke said: “The public interest in withholding the information outweighs the public interest in disclosing it.”
The borough’s libraries are currently undergoing an overhaul which has seen £2million wiped off the department’s budget over the next four years. A savings drive under the “Growing Your Own Library” scheme has involved the introduction of self-service machines. Fifteen jobs have been axed from the service with more expected to be cut later this year.
Since October, 20 staff have either been made redundant, or have agreed to take voluntary redundancy. A total of 45 staff applied to take early retirement. There have been accusations that the five staff given the redundancy pay-offs were all popular with bosses who made the final decision.
Information released by the Town Hall also showed that consultants were paid roughly £1,000 per day to re-train staff earlier this year.
Two “external training providers” were hired at a cost of £17,625 for an 18-day “learning and development programme,” Mr Clarke confirmed.
Last year American design company IDEO were paid £2,000 a day to revamp Camden’s libraries at a time of staff cuts.
A Town Hall spokeswoman said: “We are currently undertaking a training programme for library staff between February and May, at a cost of approximately £100 per person.
“As the Council makes its services more accessible to residents we are training staff to focus more on improved customer care and helping our staff to support the varied needs of library customers for information, learning, reading and how they can access council services through their library. While the courses will continue until May, initial feedback from those who have attended these training courses has been mostly positive.”