County Council needs more effective Workforce Planning.

8.22.32am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 18th Jun 2007

The Liberal Democrat group have called for Surrey County Council to introduce more effective workforce planning. In order to provide good quality, value for money services, the Council needs to plan and manage its workforce to ensure that it has the right number of people who are suitably qualified and trained and in the right places to provide the services that Surrey residents need. The first step towards achieving this objective is to develop an effective workforce plan. This plan should set out how the Council would recruit, support, develop and retain the employees it needs currently and in the future.

Hazel Watson, leader of the Liberal Democrat group, said: "The Business Delivery Review involved making short-term savings which have wasted money because effective workforce planning was not part of the process. Consequently posts within Highways were removed, which was found to be a mistake because it meant that the staffing levels within Highways were inadequate to cope with the workload. That is why extra Highways officers are now being recruited. Overall, the quality of the Highways service suffered as a consequence of BDR and money was wasted removing posts and then replacing them."

Cllr Watson added: "It is essential for the Council to develop an effective Workforce Plan to ensure that its most important resource, the staff, are effectively managed so that good quality, value for money services are delivered for Surrey residents."

The evidence suggests that the Council's workforce planning is ineffective because:

• There are serious skill shortages shown by the high vacancy levels of 14% across the Council and 17.2% in the Families service.

• The Council is overspending on agency staff by £8.5 million and that is putting the Council's budget under pressure.

• The training budget has been cut by over £400,000 this year. This puts at risk the training that is needed to deliver effective services, given the considerable staff changes as a consequence of the BDR.

• Staff morale is at an all time low within the organisation. High vacancy levels are putting staff under stress, as they are over-worked. The fact that all is not well is shown by the worsening sickness rate.