Northumberland Conservatives back in again!

 

                                 No  1605 25th August 2023

HIGH FLYER

YET another example of a council losing shedloads of taxpayers' money by getting involved in a business venture it was not qualified for, Northumberland county council failed to follow guidelines when setting up a business with a local NHS trust to market a health consultancy which dabbled as far afield as China.

     An internal investigation has found unlawful payments were made to seven high ranking officers, who were given final payouts totalling £1.3m. None of the exit packages were formally agreed by elected members.

     Last year, the council's business venture with Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust was found to have incurred "unlawful expenditure" over four years since 2017. An internal investigation into the setting up of Northumbria International Alliance (NIA) revealed the Council had not adhered to the Localism Act of 2011 by designating NIA as a council business.

     As reported in the Eye 1579, the then council chief executive Daljit Lally was given an extra £40,000 a year on top of her council salary of £190,000. For being involved with NIA. She flew to the Middle East seven times at the cost of almost £19,000.

     An investigation by external auditor John Gilbert into NIA has found it operated without proper management. Decisions were taken at informal meetings by a handful of councillors. Records do not even show if the business made a profit or a loss.

     The council's audit committee was told that seven payouts totalling £1.3m were issued to senior county hall officials between 2017 and 2022 without proper sign-off from elected councillors. Exit payments to chief council officers must be approved by the authority's staff and appointments committee or by full council if the severance package exceeds £100,000, but this was not done. A provision detailing these rules in the councils pay policy was removed between 2019 and 2022 " for reasons that are unclear" a report to councillors has revealed.

     Members have been told by Tory council leader Cllr Glen Sanderson that the council is not taking action to recoup the money. He said: "The advice we have had from our experts is that it would be very difficult and very expensive to try to get that money back, even though there is a strong temptation for us to want to try." Easy come easy go!

Note

Northumberland county council has been run by the conservatives since 2017 until the present day. The council has had two decision making leaders in that time, Cllr Peter Jackson and Cllr Glen Sanderson and two deputy leaders Cllr Wayne Daley and Cllr Richard Wearmouth.