A report compiled by the TaxPayers Alliance has found that Hertsmere Council Spent £349,921.00 on 10 Settlement Agreements in 3 years between 2016-19.
10 Settlement Agreements
The TaxPayers Alliance commissioned the report to determine how much local authorities had paid out nationwide on settlement agreements between 2016-19. As a whole, the report found that the local authorities entered into an astonishing combined total of 6,980 settlement agreements during the 3 year period, with £98,059,105,00 paid in aggregate. The average payout was £14,048.59.
The highest total amount paid out during the years 2016-19 was by Stoke-on-Trent City Council, who paid out £8,552,433.00 in relation to 371 settlement agreements, which was also the highest number of settlement agreements entered into by any one Council. This included a pay out of £195,463.00 to just one particular individual, the highest known individual pay out by a local authority during the 3 period. The average pay out by Stoke-on-Trent City Council was £23,052.38
The highest average payout during the 3 year period was by Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council, with an average payout on their settlement agreements of £79,628.00. That Council paid out a total of £398,139.50 on 5 settlement agreements
In comparison, Hertsmere Council paid out £349,921.00 on 10 Settlement Agreements during the period 2016-19. The average pay out across the 10 settlement agreements was £34,992.10. Not only is that well above the national average for local authorities of £14,048.59, but it is also well above those of 3 neighbouring local authorities in Hertfordshire.
In terms of the neighbouring Hertfordshire local authorities, Three Rivers District Council spent £184,671.27 on 9 settlement agreements. Whilst this was 1 less settlement agreement compared to the 10 settlement agreements entered into by Hertsmere Council, the average payout of £20,519.03 was well below that of Hertsmere Council
The average pay outs by Watford Borough Council and Dacorum Borough Council were lower still. Watford Borough Council spent £109,391.20 on 10 settlement agreements, with an average pay out of £10,939.12 across those 10 settlement agreements. Meanwhile, Dacorum Borough Council paid out just £18,500.00 on 3 settlement agreements, with an average spend of only £6,166.67 per settlement agreement.
Commenting upon the higher than average spend across the 10 settlement agreements, a representative for Hertsmere Council stated: "Between 2016 and 2019 we undertook a significant organisational change which included a reduction in the chief officer tier from a structure with three chief officers down to two. This enabled us to make the necessary savings to balance our budget. In all instances the costs can be recovered within a reasonable period of time (often just one year but never more than three years). The 50 councils that have spent nothing on settlement agreements may not have made the kind of changes, nor achieved the level of savings that we have over the last three years."
The representative added: "The settlement agreements frequently include the costs of redundancy payments and other contractual payments such as holiday pay, that would have to be made whether a settlement agreement was entered into or not. Some councils may publish only the discretionary sums involved but we publish all the costs, whether discretionary or contractual."
Freedom of Information Requests
The statistics used in the TayPayers Alliance report, including on the 10 settlement agreements that were entered in to by Hertsmere Council, were obtained through the making of freedom of information requests. Moreover, a considerable number of freedom of information requests have been submitted by the press in recent years, as the substantial sums being paid out by local authorities have come under growing scrutiny.
One freedom of information request revealed that between April 2015- August 2019, Thanet Council paid out £446,503.00 on over 30 settlement agreements
Other sectors of society that have also come under scrutiny in relation to their settlement agreement pay outs and which have been subject to freedom of information requests, include NHS Trusts, as we highlighted in a recent article
