Agenda item

Ms A Beer, Director of Personnel and Development, will attend the meeting from 10.30 am to 11.15 am to answer Members’ questions on this item.

Ms Beer and Mr Carter were present for this item.

The Chairman read a section from the constitution (Appendix 4 part 2, Para 2.3) which stated that no discussion should take place in a meeting about the terms or conditions of employment or the conduct of any officer of the Council unless the meeting had first considered whether to exclude the public.  The Committee were happy to proceed with the item on the public side of the agenda as the three spokespeople had previously taken advice from the Head of Legal Service and the Head of Personnel.

Mr Hart raised the issue of the Chief Executive’s ‘other allowances’ which related to the sale of untaken annual leave.  He considered it to be an incredible figure and he questioned whether the sale of leave should be allowed in such a senior position.  Ms Beer responded by confirming that the ability to buy or sell annual leave was within the Kent Scheme Terms and Conditions and applied to all members of staff, on those conditions.  Mr Truelove asked the Leader of the Council whether he considered that budgets relating to senior officer salaries might need to be tightened up in the future.  Mr Carter explained that the responsibilities of the Council had increased and that the Council could be considered to be ‘leaner’ against the backdrop of the demands placed upon it. 

Mrs Dean stated that she welcomed the fact that the Chief Executive had made his salary public, she considered that a 15% performance related pay award was very high and that it might be time for the Personnel Committee to address and review the issue of performance related pay.  Mrs Dean asked what surveys were undertaken by the Council to ensure that the levels of performance reward grant were comparable with other authorities.  Ms Beer explained that KCC salaries were compared with other Local Authorities, particularly larger county councils.  KCC was a large authority and it was important to take the size of the organisation into account when considering the pay levels within the authority, unfortunately therefore direct comparators that reflected the size of the roles were relatively few.  Jobs within KCC were graded using the HAY job evaluation scheme which enabled jobs and salaries within the public and private sector to be compared.  Advice was also sought from the recruitment advertising agency on similar recently advertised jobs across the public sector but which also took into account directly comparable private sector roles.  Similarly, advice is sought from Executive Search agencies when senior position recruitment is put out to tender.  Overall there had been a steady increase in recognition of senior positions in the public service and KCC had not increased the majority of County Officers’ pay beyond the cost of living that applied to all staff within KCC.  The performance pay element reflected the fact that the base salaries compared favourably to other authorities in terms of the size of Kent. 

Mrs Dean asked whether the other Members of the Chief Officer Group had been consulted on whether they wished their salaries to be disclosed and if so what the response was.   The other issue previously raised was the discrepancy between the Chief Officer’s salaries figures published in the press.  An explanation had been given outside of the meeting but it was necessary to explain this for the benefit of Committee Members.  Ms Beer explained that because the information had been anonymised sufficiently it had not been necessary to consult with members of the Chief Officer Group on whether they wished their salaries to be made public.  The discrepancies between the information in the Statement of Accounts and the information in response to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests arose because the Statement of Accounts for a particular financial year covered the amount of money that an individual had received in that year.  In FOI requests the Council was asked how an individual was remunerated during the financial year.  It was almost always the case that performance related payments were made in the following financial year, but would relate to the previous financial year and so discrepancies would arise between the figures contained in the Statement of Accounts and responses to FOI requests.  Ms Beer explained that the Council responded to FOI requests by giving a salary range, the Chief Executive fell into the range of between £250,000 - £259,999 some of the recipients of the FOI response chose to take a mid point of that range and present that as the Chief Executive’s salary which was inaccurate. 

Mrs Dean requested information on the performance related pay award that had accrued to the Chief Officer Group, the average figure for the Chief Officer Group’s performance related pay award seemed high and Mrs Dean was interested in comparing that average pay award with other Officers within KCC.  Mrs Dean stated that of 23,000 employees 55 had received an ‘excellent’ rating, which would be broadly equivalent to the 13 – 15% pay reward that the Chief Officer Group had received.  Ms Beer explained that the majority of staff on the Kent Scheme had salary progression dependent on performance through their salary scale whereas Chief Officers were on ‘spot’ salaries.  The total amount paid to the Chief Officer Group would be provided to Committee Members.  Ms Beer confirmed that staff who received a ‘good’ rating also received an incremental increase.  To determine the number of employees who were recommended as ‘excellent’ was difficult but Ms Beer confirmed that she would see what information was available.  The Cabinet Members and the Leaders of both opposition groups were consulted as part of the performance assessment of the Chief Officer Group so the pay awards reflected the feedback received.  Mr Carter confirmed that he would welcome a discussion at the Personnel Committee about what was an appropriate level of performance award for senior directors, it was important to remember that contracts of employment had to be fulfilled.  The performance rewards for directors were measured against objectives that were set by the Chief Executive in consultation with Mr Carter, and they were monitored at the year end in consultation with the Chief Executive, Leader and the Leaders of the opposition groups.  The Council’s track record over the past 4 years had been excellent, and the Council shouldn’t be ashamed for rewarding staff for a job ‘well done’.  The Council would be reviewing the performance reward scheme to ensure that the allocations were assessed equitably across the organisation and they were implemented with rigour and this would be debated at the Personnel Committee in the coming months.  Mrs Dean endorsed the fact that performance related pay was a good tool, but it was notoriously difficult and needed to be fair across the authority.  Mrs Dean confirmed that she was consulted on the performance of the Chief Officers, but the form was a qualitative one, which required a text response on the individual’s strengths and weaknesses.  The form did not ask for a recommendation on performance pay percentage.  It was considered that it would be an improvement to the process if a quantitative section was included on the form in the future.  The Chairman explained that it was difficult to give feedback on an officer’s performance if the targets which the officers were working to were not supplied. 

Mr Smyth asked the Leader whether he supported the publication of senior officer salaries which were over £150,000, should KCC lead the way in being open and transparent?  Mr Carter stated that he believed in openness and transparency as long as it wasn’t to the detriment of any individual.  KCC’s salaries had risen in relation to inflation over the past 30 years, if anything there was a slight diminution in relation to other public sector salaries.  Ms Beer explained that KCC was responding to a consultation document on amending accounts and audit regulations to improve transparency of reporting of senior officer’s remuneration in public bodies, this would be debated with Members.  It was worth noting that KCC did give information in response to FOI requests about the level of remuneration for senior managers.  Mr Smyth concluded by stating that public companies were required to publish total emoluments, Ms Beer explained that at KCC Chief Officers salaries were ‘clean salaries’ any lease car costs etc. were paid by the individual at full cost.

Resolved that:

1. The Cabinet Scrutiny Committee thanked Ms Beer and Mr Carter for their attendance at the meeting and for answering Members’ questions;

2. The Committee also wanted to record their thanks to the Chief Executive for publishing his salary in an open and transparent way;

3. The Committee welcomed the Leader’s offer that in light of the changing economic conditions the Personnel Committee be asked to consider the future performance reward levels of the Chief Officer Group;

4. The Committee asked that the figure for the total performance reward paid to the Chief Officer Group be provided to Committee Members;

5. The Committee asked that the form used by the Opposition Leaders to evaluate the performance of the Chief Officer Group be reviewed to include the opportunity to provide quantitative feedback on the level of any performance reward grant and the detail of the performance criteria and targets that the Officers were being evaluated on.