And so having established that it is possible to become a career politician in Sunny Colch and be paid £65k plus, the wonga trousering trail took us towards Non-Executive and Board positions.
The hint to ask questions came from… a prominent Board member overseeing a major outsourcing of CBC infrastructure, right here in Britain’s Oldest Recorded.
Blimey.
First of all, a huge thanks to Mike Fawcett, the Information Officer at CBC. Attending to FOI’s so efficiently in the first week of the New Year probably wasn’t what yer man Mike had in mind as he put away the Christmas Tree for yet another year.
Job’s a good ‘un.
A bit like some of the posts held by various CBC Councillors.
The only problem is that we can’t establish how much the political Careerists can profit from these nice little earners – CBC doesn’t hold any data on this.
Which is a shame as there are *possibly* some nice little earners out there for any well-connected hyperlocal politician.
It’s not that some animals are more equal than others [but then again...] – we’d hate to paint the picture that the majority of CBC Councillors are cashing in on their status. The list of salary top ups outlined below tend to be concentrated around a specific Colchester political elite.
Nice work, etc…
Chair of Colchester Borough Homes
Board Member of Colchester Borough Homes
Chair Colne Housing Society
Director Colne Housing
Essex Police and Crime Panel
Essex Fire Authority
LGA Fire Services Management Committee
Board Member Local Government Improvement and Development
Board Member Essex Probation
Non Executive Board Director Essex Probation
Colchester Academy Trustee
Non Executive Board Director NHS North Essex
Director of the Mercury Theatre
Phew.
Networks and who you know etc are what counts. Why else do you think a public or private organisation would turn towards a political Careerist sitting in the CBC Cabinet to help advise on policy? It probably isn’t because they make for a half-decent mug shot in the annual corporate report.
Declarations of interests are duly observed at Full Council, Cabinet and Planning etc. No one is suggesting that anything underhand is being played out here.
But The Chronic has commented before on the farce of a Cabinet member declaring an interest whenever an issue is ‘debated’ [yeah, right...] that crosses over with their moonlighting roles out in the real world.
The Cabinet Careerist duly leaves the room, and allows the other Comrades to continue with the debate. It’s make a mockery of democracy – CBC is ‘paying’ for their input, yet their outside interests prevent them from offering this for the public good.
The political Careerist can catch up with what was mentioned in the minutes, whilst their experience isn’t allowed to be made use of in the ‘debate’ as their corporate interest excludes it.
That’s the, *ahem* price you pay for democracy, Comrades.
Can anyone confirm *possible* remuneration figures for any of these posts please?
2 Comments
Being on the Mercury Board doesn’t pay anything, and I’m pretty sure the only remuneration for being on the board of CBH is tea and biscuits at meetings (if that). The Chair of the CBH Board might be a paid position, but IIRC, that’s not currently held by a councillor.
There is an allowance for being on the Fire Authority (as there was for the old Police Authority) – that should be listed on the ECC website, I think – but I don’t know if the members of the Police and Crime Panel get anything (though the Police and Crime Commissioner gets a hefty allowance and has the power to appoint well-paid deputies too).
When I was on the board of CBH I was not paid and I am sure it is still the same. I know it helped my residents in Council housing that I was on the board. A lot of a Councillors work is social housing so to have an insight into how an organisation like CBH deals with issues is an asset. If you gain experience in housing through the board of CBH, you may then feel qualified to be on the board of another housing organisation and bring your expertise to them.
Councillors tend to be on boards because they are the caring sort and voluntarily give their time – perhaps you should also ask which Councillors are voluntary members of other organisations and give their time for nothing. If you added the hours up for those organisations I am sure they would far outweigh the hours in paid roles. How many are school governors or trustees?
All Councillors are voted by their residents. Bottom line is if they don’t think they are doing their job properly, don’t vote for them.