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Stornoway, Lewis
Thousands of council workers asked to consider redundancy 15/11/10
All staff at Western Isles Council are being invited to consider taking redundancy
as the cash-
Personnel across the
board including senior managers, clerks and manual workers have been sent letters
in recent days asking if they have an interest in applying for voluntary severance.
The
appeal for redundancies across the entire workforce could potentially reduce the
staff numbers by around 15%.
However, a council spokesman highlights the authority
has no specific target and one factor governing the outcome depends on how necessary
each applicant’s job is.
Already jobs have gone in the council’s technical department
and teachers are being offered early retirement.
While the council has not ruled out
compulsorily redundancies it hopes enough suitable volunteers from its 2550-
Councillors are
considering a wide range of options to slash spending by about £24 million over four
years.
Bosses have gone through spending plans looking if they could curbing 20% off
budgets to tackle the fall in funding from central government
The launch of the redundancy
exercise coincides with a consultation with each council department examining the
potential cutting of services, senior posts, reducing the number of white collar
chiefs and redistributing services to save money.
Ali Maclennan, Unison representative
at the council said: “We have been expecting this for some time.“
He accepts cuts
have to be made but is concerned they will be “too heavy and too rushed.” He urges
the council’s representatives on Cosla to lobby the Scottish Government to opt for
alternative measures.
Mr Maclennan explained: “Unison are encouraging the taxing of
the banks and targeting tax avoidance. Even these two measures would add up to a
lot.”
The council says a raft of other cutback measures are also being planned and
will be discussed at a series of council meetings and closed seminars on the run
up to voting on the final budget strategy in February.