Thanet council’s use of non-disclosure agreements – authorised cash settlements as long as details on the issue are not made public – is under scrutiny by external auditors.
Grant Thornton LLP, which audits the authority, say a delay to issuing a value for money conclusion in the accounts comes after a complaint was made about the NDA use.
That complaint was lodged by Broadstairs resident and former councillor Ian Driver who had previously obtained figures for the amount spent on the gagging orders through a Freedom of Information request.
The details released from that request show that £446,503 was spent on orders between April 2015 and the end of August 2019. Payments were made to more than 30 staff during that timeframe.
Mr Driver says a further request shows £268,000 was spent in 2019-20 on securing NDAs.
In a letter to the auditor he said: “I wish to make an objection about the management of non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) agreed with departing council staff during the 2019-20 financial year.
“According to a Freedom of Information request I submitted to the council the organisation spent £268,000 in 2019-20 on securing NDAs. This request was made in early March 2020. I suspect that the actual figure may be higher.
“I have reason to believe that one of those NDAs was agreed between the Council and former employee (who) is reported to have made very serious allegations of bullying.”
The former employee NDA is related to a letter sent to Thanet councillors in September by a GMB Union officer, outlining claims from a council employee who raised a grievance against members of the senior management team in June/July 2019..
The letter said the employee and the union member were told to sign Non Disclosure Agreements to read the independent investigation report into the complaint.
Council chief executive Madeline Homer has delegated powers to authorise settlements up to £100,000.
Grant Thornton said further enquiries into the objection are needed before the firm issues its 2019/20 value for money conclusion.
‘Review’
The report by Grant Thornton says: “During 2019/20 a number of matters were brought to the auditor’s attention regarding grievances and the arrangements in place to respond to those grievances.
“As part of our value for money conclusion we are reviewing the arrangements the council has followed to respond to the grievances.”
A council spokesperson said: “An objection has been received and is being handled in line with standard procedure. That won’t prevent the auditor from concluding the audit on our financial statement of accounts. It is not unusual for an external auditor to have not resolved all objections by the time the accounts are agreed. Approval of the accounts was deferred to a future meeting due to a separate technical issue regarding asset valuations.”
The council’s statement of accounts 2019/20 document, recently published, also mentions: “It should be noted that Internal Audit have raised some concerns with the Council’s three statutory officers (the Chief Executive, the Deputy Chief Executive and the Corporate Director of Governance), the external auditors Grant Thornton, the Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Governance and Audit committee regarding some matters that Internal Audit have been involved during the year, which were still to be resolved.”
The governance and audit concern likely relates to a letter sent by the East Kent Internal Audit Partnership head Christine Parker.
Redundancies
The accounts also reveal that there were 11 compulsory redundancies during the 2019/20 tax year. Seven of those staff earned no more than £20,000, three earned between £20,000-£40,000 and one earned between £40,000-£60,000.
There were also seven ‘other departures’ of staff earning under £40,000. The total paid out in ‘packages’ was £362,000, compared to £138,000 the year before.
The accounts statement says: “The council terminated the contracts of 18 employees in 2019-20. This included 5 planned redundancies at Ramsgate Port at a cost of £114k to provide the on-going savings required to balance the 2019-20 budget.
“It also included 5 redundancies within East (Kent) Services following a restructure of the ICT service at a cost of £127k. As this is a shared service with Dover District Council and Canterbury City Council, TDC’s share of the redundancies related to this restructure was only £42k. Within the total payment of £362k there were no enhancements of retirement benefits.”
I’d better go and buy some popcorn!
Grant Thornton just whitewashed Wirral Council who’d plunged their Council tax payers, their children and grandchildren into £295 million of foreseeable, avoidable LOBO loan debt with foreign banks which ends in 2078.
Like Wirral, Thanet Council pay Grant Thornton very sizeable annual fees for their compliance. Expect a whitewash in due course.
See the Wirral In It Together blog for much more detail of their sordid, gangster like behaviour.
Quite happy to accept a hundred grand to stop my moaning of our inept council on here.. used twenties would be fine 😉
Grant Thornton are still investigating objections raised against the 2018/19 accounts – don’t hold your breath and don’t expect them to rock the boat.
Blue Fox
Grant Thornton are unable to respond, due to a gagging order placed upon them.
Grant Thornton took 4 years 2 months to whitewash my LOBO loans qualifying objection.
Madeline Homer should not have authority to sign off packages under £100k. There needs to be Councillor oversight and scrutiny at a much lower level.
I also find the words TDC have used to be disingenuous. They quote 10 staff with a total redundancy figure of £156k but no mention of the other 8 whose packages totalled over £200k. Are they actually saying that no member of staff who was made redundant in the last year had to be paid their pension early?
It used to be common practice within councils to pay enough redundancy to actually cover the salary loss of those reiring in the near future any way. I know someone who took voluntary redundancy 3 1/2 years early and received a lump sum equivalent to nearly 4 years takehome pay. ( this wasn’t at tdc).
I may be being very naive, but why do you have to pay a any non-disclosure agreements. Unless you need to hide something. So much for transparency from TDC.
The cover up is in full swing now see who gets replaced next week The Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Governance and Audit committee regarding some matters that Internal Audit have been involved during the year, which were still to be resolved.
When I took voluntary severance from an organisation, in return for a lump sum I signed an NDA.
It’s rather common practice.
Quite often, ex-employees agree not to seek employment with competitors for a period of years.
I imagine that one reason for NDAs is to limit the amount of muck spreading (real or imagined) that disgruntled ex-employees might be tempted to engage in.
It is ironic that it falls to a former councillor to shine a light on potential bad practices or worse within TDC.
Why aren’t the labour group through their oversight or scrutiny functions dealing with these matters?
It’s not only redundancy packages nda’s employment practices and blurred working relationships that need looking into it is procurement asset management and disposal that need addressing.
The senior officers have long been unaccountable and seem to operate like a cabal so it’s about time their practises are being scrutinised.
TDC senior officers need clearing out as it appears to outsiders that the council is rotten to the core !
How many months have half the lights on the Dreamland listed cinema Finn supposedly a Thanet asset not been working ? Where is the civic pride gone ?
TDC has no civic pride , just filthy streets.
The Dreamland lights have never really worked properly, they’re part of margates dishevelled “charm” ( if you believe innsuch guff)
See our survey of 345 English councils which discovered that £224 million had been squandered on gagging agreements 😧
Search: Wirral In It Together compromise agreements
In Germany, when you sign your new work contract and the company has sensitive information, then with signing to work with them, it includes a clause that doesn’t allow the new employee to talk about any company details.
Its an honourable thing and people do not get any money for signing it.
The spending on gagging orders is incredible in this country and how much s**t is there to hide one asks?!
But we’re not in Germany, and we are not signing a new work contract, strangely we are reading a news article.
The most corrupt local authority around between the 90s to 2015. Specially some of the returning cllrs in the tory party front bench.
My ex girlfriend used to be interested in gagging, but it was never anything to do with the council.