Shock at cost of temporary staff used by Highland Council
An agency worker was paid almost £40,000 more for six months’ work than a Highland Council employee was paid for an entire year, an investigation into temporary staff has revealed.
Opposition leader Maxine Smith was "shocked and worried" when she discovered that 447 staff currently employed by the local authority on a temporary basis are paid more than £100 per day and one agency worker has banked £115,000 for six months work in a post which had an annual salary of £77,000 when it was held by a permanent employee.
Councillor Smith, who represents Cromarty Firth and leads the council’s SNP group, targeted the corporate resources chief at a full council meeting on Thursday.
"When I was investigating this I uncovered quite a few agency staff who are paid a lot more than £100 per day and that surprised me," she said.
"One post covered was an agency worker is in place to cover the vacant post in digital transformation. That salary used to be around £77,000 for a permanent employee.
"Over a six month period our council has paid £115,203 to this agency member which if you double that the salary would have been £230,000 which is a heck of a lot.
"Do you think the public would endorse this kind of money being spent on one salary for one post?"
Alister Mackinnon, the chairman of corporate resources, promised to investigate the matter but declined to comment further.
"I can’t comment on that but I can assure you that I will look into the case and come back to you," he told Councillor Smith.
Afterwards Cllr Smith raised concerns about the cost of temporary staff to the cash-strapped council, as well as the treatment of staff.
"I was shocked to see that we still have over 400 employees on regular agency contracts," she said. "This seems to indicate that we pay over 12 per cent of our staff through an agency, so surely there is a saving in there somewhere if people were to be paid directly from the council in some sort of ‘bank of staff system’ and surely this would also be better for them with regard to terms and conditions.
"I think the more worrying aspect of this is that I did not ask how many are paid over £500 per day as this figure might indeed shock me further.
"I am currently looking into some staff on temporary contracts, who are commanding six figure sums over a six-month period."
