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Cllr Richard Watts
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Town Hall’s £5m consultants bill
Spending on ‘branded frisbees’ under attack
THE Town Hall bill for external consultants topped £5 million last year, the Tribune has learned.
The amount paid to consultants has nearly doubled in the past five years. Figures released to the Tribune under the Freedom of Information Act show that in 2001 the council spent £2.8 million on consultants. By last year this figure had risen to £5.05 million, bringing the total spent on consultants to £21.54 million in five years.
At the same time, Town Hall bosses have admitted they do not keep a running tally of how much is spent on promotional items such as branded pens and keyrings. The list of branded items includes mugs, paperweights, tins of Smarties and even frisbees.
In a reply to opposition Labour councillors, Lib Dem customer focus chief Councillor George Allan revealed that last year £1,300 was spent on pens, pencils and balloons to promote road safety and £1,000 on mouse mats, pens and pencils to encourage recycling.
He added: “The council does not record aggregated expenditure at this level of detail.”
Labour this week attacked the Lib Dems for spending money “hand over fist” on “freebies” and consultants.
The Freedom of Information Act figures show belt-tightening under previous finance chief Arnie Gibbons reduced the amount spent on consultants from £5.34 million in 2003 to £4.36 million the following year. But expenditure shot back up again last year as a number of key contracts came up for renewal.
Councillor Richard Watts, Labour’s finance spokesman, said: “The Lib Dems seems to be spending money hand over fist on everything from consultants to branded frisbees and don’t have a clue how much of our money they’re spending.
“Employing consultants and agency staff is a very expensive way for the council to employ people and council tax-payers get a better deal from permanent staff employed by the council.
“Furthermore, if the Lib Dems don’t know how much they are spending on important services, they have no way of controlling the budget.”
Cllr Allan said: “In today’s world we have to work increasingly hard to get our promotional messages across, and small items like this are a legitimate way to do it.
“Apparently, Labour think green travel, child protection and road safety aren’t worth promoting. These are things residents need to know about, and we use a variety of ways of telling them. If a frisbee helps save a child’s life, is it expensive?”
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