Share

City Council launches consultations on job reductions

Aberdeen City Council has begun consultations with employees and trade unions on the need to reduce the size of its workforce to help balance the budget next year.

Trade unions have received letters from the City Council explaining the budget situation and the need to make savings, including through job reductions. The issue of the letters marks the start of a 90-day consultation period on ways of minimising the impact of the reductions.

All local authorities are required by law to hold consultations with employees and their trade union representatives if staffing reductions are being considered.

The economic climate for the public sector remains extremely tight but Aberdeen City Council has agreed a costed Five Year Business Plan in order to be fully prepared to meet the financial challenges ahead and to deliver services within the resources available.

The plan – which is based on a forecast £127 million reduction in income along with extra cost pressures between now and 2015/16 – contains a detailed range of budget policy options, which involve transforming the way some services are delivered, bringing in efficiency savings, and stopping or reducing some services.

The City Council is anticipating a reduction of 150 jobs in 2012/13 as part of its priority-based budgeting approach, to reduce costs further and to fit the reorganisation and realignment of services.

Significant job reductions over the past three years have been managed without the need for compulsory redundancies. The City Council will make every effort to achieve the further reductions in 2012/13 through voluntary severance and early retirement, by redeploying employees to other posts, and by deleting posts which are lying vacant and unfilled. Compulsory redundancies cannot be absolutely ruled out, however, and the Council will consult on the selection criteria should compulsory redundancies be required.

Detailed work is ongoing to identify specific options for job reductions, which will be shared with trade union representatives once the work is complete. The city council has started the statutory consultations at this time to allow it to be well placed to make the savings from the start of the next financial year.

Aberdeen City Council Chief Executive Valerie Watts said: “We will be working closely with our employees and the trade unions to minimise the impact of job reductions. But we must face up together to the realities of the very difficult economic climate and the extremely tight financial settlements we will be receiving for the foreseeable future.

“The whole of the public sector is having to confront similar challenges – but Aberdeen City Council is one of the best prepared public bodies in Scotland to meet the challenge and was highlighted very recently by the local authority watchdog Audit Scotland as a prime example of effective forward planning.

“Our employees and elected members at Aberdeen City Council have carried out a huge amount of work to pinpoint our priorities, in consultation with our citizens and with a wide range of organisations in this city.

“We are well prepared to deliver efficient, effective and excellent services while living within our means – and the City Council’s senior management will continue to work very closely with our employees to make sure that the inevitable job reductions are managed sensitively for all concerned.“

88 views