Its quite clear that our beloved council wastes our money, this is nothing new and it will continue to happen! This post was requested by Mr K O
(the council had spent £703,735 on specialist consultants alone linked to the Mochdre “shed” and an ongoing legal battle.) Words fail me! How was no one sacked for this?
CONWY Council’s hiring of external consultants is not a luxury in many cases despite public perception, said a cabinet member defending how money was spent by the authority.
At a democratic services committee this week at the council’s Coed Pella HQ in Colwyn Bay, councillors debated draft contract procedure rules.
The debate included Cllr Paul Luckock referring to “the enormous amount of money” spent on the Mochdre HGV depot, which has cost the council £3.2m over 10 years despite never being used.
A recent Freedom of Information request by the local democracy reporting service revealed the council had spent £703,735 on specialist consultants alone linked to the Mochdre “shed” and an ongoing legal battle.
But speaking at the meeting, Cllr Anne McCaffrey questioned the council’s process when outsourcing work to external consultant companies.
“Who is the gatekeeper of the need to spend on consultants, because from my recollection I don’t recall having any reports that actually detail our spend across the council in terms of use of consultants and what the checks and balances are in place to ensure that we only spend the minimum, because by definition consultants are really expensive?”
She added: “How do we evaluate the need to spend on consultants?”
Council officers explained a dedicated procurement board will authorise consultants being hired once a department signs off the work.
The officers said the board was made up of the chief executive, the head of finance, and a creditor manager, who would assess whether the consultants were value for money and considered essential spending.
Cllr McCaffrey then pressed for more information on how the process worked and if it was scrutinised by democracy.
But Cllr Stephen Price, the cabinet member for housing, regulatory, and audit, said he would respond in writing as he didn’t have all the information.
Cabinet member for finance and strategic planning, Cllr Chris Cater, then said that consultants were not always a luxury.
He cited a “small team” of council officers working on the RLDP (replacement local development plan) as an example of the council needing to hire consultants.
“We all know that the situation with consultancies, if we went into the intricacies of it, is we could spend a couple of hours discussing the ins and outs of using various consultants, but as you know, some of our teams are very small,” he said.
“And I’m just thinking of our RLDP process that we are just going through, where we’ve got a small team of strategic planners. We do have to use consultants, both for their specialist knowledge and also for the fact we don’t have the capacity in that small team, so I just would like to put that into perspective. I think some people immediately think that employing consultants is a luxury, and in so many cases it isn’t.”
Cllr McCaffrey said she thought more oversight was needed in scrutinising the use of consultants.
Cllr Chris Hughes proposed councillors agreed they had reviewed and commented on the report. This was seconded by Cllr Sue Shotter, and the report was backed.
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