Every year you receive a nice glossy leaflet from Craven District Council called:
“Your Guide to the Council Tax.”
This little document carries explanations on such as:
“How does the council spend my money?”
Where little pie charts and figures tell you, for example, that of the total expenditure, Employees cost a mere 5.7%
A statement underneath informs you in all seriousness that the cost of employees stands at £1,319,000
Nothing could be plainer, could it? Although you might wonder how £1,319,000 is a mere 5.7% of the £7,000,000 total that the council has for its own income!
Read on for the explanation of this example of council mathematics.*
And the present issue of ‘Your Craven’ carries a happy smiling Chief Executive telling us how efficient the council is, and how the council invests in its staff.
Well that part is very true, unlike the first two statements.
In the year ending 31/3/05 the cost of employees was around £7,000,000 a figure in excess of £5,500,000 more than the glossy leaflet tells us, and considerably more than 5.7% of total expenditure. Employee costs now equal the total that council tax brings in for the last financial year.
Employee numbers?
Under this Chief Executive numbers soared from 223 in 2002/3 to 275 by December 2005, and the pensions deficit for all these people soared from circa £7 Million in 2002 to circa £17 Million in 2005.
Of course the council will tell you that this is mainly because of new methods of determining the deficit, BUT, for comparison, North Yorkshire County Council’s pension deficit stands at around £12,000 per employee, that of Craven District Council at around £62,000 per employee.
Money Matters is the subject of another article on this website, simply click on the article titled ‘Money’.
* Sorry, we were guilty of copying the council in being economical with the truth, because we cannot understand how they worked this out at all. The Director of Finance has promised to make the 2007 leaflet more honest, but alas! He has just resigned.
As did the last Director of Finance, a year ago.
So perhaps the council won’t correct their glossy little leaflet, and the lies -