Our new report Council Spending Uncovered 2: Middle Management Pay is out today. We've had a very predictable response from the councils. Some have blamed us for their failure to separate out teachers from regular council workers. Others have cited competition for staff from the private sector.
This is a pretty weak argument when you consider that many of these councils had dozens of staff paid more than the £60,000 average pay that directors at companies with turnovers of £5-50 million enjoy (according to research for the Institute of Directors, not online). They're using their half a billion pound publicity machine to try and deny this report instead of accepting the obvious truth that the number of staff earning over £50,000 shouldn't be going up three times as fast in local councils as it is in the economy as a whole.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of people really attached to the status quo in the Council Tax debate: councils blame the Government and the Government blames councils. No one takes responsibility. Ordinary taxpayers pay the price in the form of a doubling of Council Tax over the last ten years with further big rises to come.
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