Fat Cats, Getting Fatter?

[Planner1]

1 hour ago, Anna B said:

IMO a lot of the rot set in when they stopped promoting exceptional workers from the bottom, up the greasy pole, to the top, so that ability was matched by a wealth of experience at all levels.

 

Too many senior executives are graduates with plenty of 'book learning' and qualifications but precious little else. They go straight in at a senior level. Old school coppers for example insist that working from the round up gives them 'a nose' for policing which graduates lack. I think that's probably true of a number of professions.

To add to that, they are often recruited from a very few 'top drawer' Universities, so you have the same elite crew doing the rounds of all the top jobs. Before anyone reminds me that these Universities only accept exceptional students, I beg to differ. There are a fair few 'Hooray Henries' and Henriettas in there as well who only got in there because Daddy knows all the right strings to pull....  

 

7% of the population went to private schools, but fill 70% of all the top jobs.

Class discrimination is still very much alive in Great Britain and always has been..   

If you think any of this public school network stuff applies to councils I believe you are very mistaken.

 

Theres nothing stopping anyone being a success and there aren’t the qualification / membership of professional institutions requirements that prevailed when I started in local government ( at least in my line of work. 
 

I didn’t get a degree and I started work as an apprentice and got to be what was described by some (not me) as a “senior” manager.

 

The very senior people at councils, like chief execs and executive directors are appointed by the councillors, so it’s hardly likely that any of them are ex public school around here. 
 

FYI, in my line of work and in other professions, graduates come in at “professional” level and in some places get accelerated progression up a “career grade” as they gain experience and get professionally qualified. They don’t become managers unless they apply for and get a vacant post via competitive interview.  Not everywhere has graduate training schemes anymore as local government isn’t that attractive to them, as they can get much better pay and experience in the private sector. 

[Planner1]

2 hours ago, Grumpycatweasel said:

Why should i pay council tax for some council member to take home a 6 figure salary?

 

I’m all for paying for essential services but the incompetence of SCC do not deserve 100,000+ salaries 

 

Should we collectively stop paying CT until salaries are adjusted / normalised 

 

 

A member is a councillor.

 

They get an absolute pittance of an “allowance”.

 

Public authorities should pay the going rate for the job. Why should public servants be grossly underpaid. Do you think there’s massive job satisfaction in it nowadays? 

[Grumpycatweasel]

Just now, Planner1 said:

A member is a councillor.

 

They get an absolute pittance of an “allowance”.

 

Public authorities should pay the going rate for the job. Why should public servants be grossly underpaid. Do you think there’s massive job satisfaction in it nowadays? 

Are you stating £40k-£50k a year is grossly underpaid? 

[Grumpycatweasel]

Please tell me one decision a councillor has to make that deserves a £100k+ salary? 

[Planner1]

2 hours ago, Grumpycatweasel said:

We pay those salaries yet receive inconsistent management & planning of Sheffield 

 

 

So basically you mean that the council makes decisions you disagree with for reasons you don’t understand.

 

Public authorities will always make decisions some don’t agree with. That’s why the decision makers ( councillors) are accountable at the ballot box. 
 

Do you think that managers/owner/decision makers in the private sector always get it right and can please everyone? Think again.

[Grumpycatweasel]

If these head honcho councillors had enough academic prowess surely they would working in the private sector earning more 

 

Yet here they are poorly managing Sheffield City with an unjustified pay packet 

[Grumpycatweasel]

How do we measure the success of SCC when were in a cost of living crisis 

 

who’s fault is that? The people ?

 

or the councils/gov? 

[Grumpycatweasel]

18 hours ago, hauxwell said:

Why does the Chief Executive of the council and others get paid more than a Member of Parliament and the Prime Minister?

As HeHasRisen has pointed out if you pay peanuts you get monkeys.  

 

 

Yet we are paying extortionate salaries for monkeys 

[Anna B]

1 hour ago, Planner1 said:

If you think any of this public school network stuff applies to councils I believe you are very mistaken.

 

Theres nothing stopping anyone being a success and there aren’t the qualification / membership of professional institutions requirements that prevailed when I started in local government ( at least in my line of work. 
 

I didn’t get a degree and I started work as an apprentice and got to be what was described by some (not me) as a “senior” manager.

 

The very senior people at councils, like chief execs and executive directors are appointed by the councillors, so it’s hardly likely that any of them are ex public school around here. 
 

FYI, in my line of work and in other professions, graduates come in at “professional” level and in some places get accelerated progression up a “career grade” as they gain experience and get professionally qualified. They don’t become managers unless they apply for and get a vacant post via competitive interview.  Not everywhere has graduate training schemes anymore as local government isn’t that attractive to them, as they can get much better pay and experience in the private sector. 

Yes, I know councillors have to stand and be elected, and in theory, anyone can become a councillor, but It's the workers who do the jobs and the middle management that organises that, probably on fairly ordinary wages. But they are not the ones I am talking about. The ones I mean are the 'add ons' that we now have, like a police commissioners and a super mayors and Chief Executives. Not only are they paid well over their worth, if they do **** things up they are never held to account, never sacked, simply moved to another similarlarly well paid job, (See Paula Vennels' CV) 

 

In local government they have no business expecting to receive the same salaries as private business executives as they are paid from the public purse which has serious constraints. Private business executives on the other hand decide their own pay package and are extremely generous to themselves, but then they would be wouldn't they as they hold themselves in such high esteem...  So high that it has bankrupted more than one previously successful company and brought it down... even they can't afford such ridiculous pay outs and bonuses any more, (which longer acurately reflect the success of the company, but are at the whim of the Chief Executives, 'because they're worth it,' says no one but the chief executive.... (see Paula Vennells...)

 

I believe the Mayor and Commissioner has to be voted for by the local electorate, (I could be wrong,) but more to the point, we were never asked if we thought we needed one, or thought it was a good use of our money/taxes, which is the real question so it's rather a moot point  As Sheffield rarely has many Conservative Councillors, those doing the appointing will be mainly Liberal and Labour, but it's very different in the corridors of real power in the the  South East and the Shires where the Tories hold sway. 

 

  

[SheffieldForum]

2 hours ago, Grumpycatweasel said:

Are you stating £40k-£50k a year is grossly underpaid? 

 

2 hours ago, Grumpycatweasel said:

Please tell me one decision a councillor has to make that deserves a £100k+ salary? 

What councillors are earning those types of numbers for being a councillor?!