It's why the trade unions bankroll the Labour Party; big business bankrolls the Conservative Party; and each looks after their own. Not directly, of course. There's seldom a clear-cut paper-trail. And I'm certainly not suggesting any kind of improper relationship. But some facts just scream out to be reported and readers encouraged to form their own judgements. So here goes.
Cornwall Council often has a need for temporary workers. Hiring temps is itself a time-consuming business so last year the council contracted a company called Comensura to do it. Comensura, based in Luton, does not actually have a vast reservoir of council workers itself, but instead provides the software to find staff with the appropriate skills and qualifications. There was no public debate about this and not one single member of the council has had any opportunity to vote on it.
It is not disputed that agency workers are often on minimum wages and go without holiday, sick pay or pensions. Although the last Labour government introduced the Agency Worker Regulations in January last year, in a bid to comply with European Union legislation protecting workers' rights, the rules are not due to be implemented until October this year. The Conservatives made it clear before last year's election they opposed the regulations. The department for Business, Innovation & Skills now says it will "adjust its guidance" about the new regulations before October.
The council's current contract with Comensura is worth £200,000 a year, although the total spend on temporary workers is close to £8.5million. Comensura makes its money by charging about 30 pence on each transaction. Senior council officials are so pleased with the arrangement that they now want to increase the volume of business with Comensura and are suggesting a "strategy for extending the use of Comensura to engage and manage all current and new interim workers."
The idea of "outsourcing" some staffing functions is not new and has its roots in the New Labour hey day. Comensura tells me that over the past ten years it has won contracts with more than 100 councils, of all political persuasions. The company declined to discuss details on the grounds of commercial confidentiality, but pointed to local authority consortia in the north west and north east which would certainly include some Labour councils.
The company's statement said:
"All of Comensura's services are procured under European Union procurement law. This guarantees a robust and strict buying procedure is followed at all times and ensures aspects, such as political party leadership, are not factors that influence decisions. Cornwall Council is a key customer of Comensura and our services will ensure that the Council get the best value for money from their usage of temporary worker suppliers."
My own research, based on news reports covering 28 local authorities, found that 75% were Tory, 14% had no overall control, 10% were Labour and 1% a Lib Dem/Plaid Cymru coalition. I accept that news reports are not the most reliable evidence, but even allowing for the decline in the number of Labour councils, and the Conservative Party's recent advances in local, this suggests Labour has been less enthusiastic about outsourcing jobs to agencies - and more sympathetic to the concerns of the trade unions. As per my opening paragraph, what goes around comes around.
Comensura is wholly-owned by a parent company called the Impellam Group, which shares the same Luton address. Until April of last year, more than 57% of Impellam was owned by Lord Ashcroft, the celebrated non-domiciled tax-dodger and historically one of the largest-ever individual donors to the Conservative Party. On 6th April 2010 Lord Ashcroft transferred his holding in Impellam to his children.
The question for Cornwall Council was simply whether it was aware that Comensura was owned by a controversial politician such as Lord Ashcroft. I don't recall much of a public debate (or even any debate at all) when Comensura was brought in last October, although I've no reason to think it was done by anything other than the normal procurement process. This is what the council had to say:
"When letting a contract the Council's main focus is to ensure the company selected has both the capacity and capability to deliver the service to the appropriate standard and offers best value for money for council taxpayers in Cornwall. Detailed evaluation of the management of the company is not key to this assessment, unless, for example, a company director has been convicted of a criminal offence or is in some other way declared inadmissible. This is certainly not the case with Comensura. As a result the Council was not aware that the parent company which owns Comensura was, itself, formerly owned by Lord Ashcroft.
"The decision to award the contract to Comensura was made using the Council's Procurement Assurance Scheme under which a panel of senior officers are required to ensure an open and transparent procurement process for all high value contracts. In accordance with the Council's normal procedure for such high value contracts, the recommendation from this panel was then considered by the relevant Corporate Director who made the final decision. There was no public debate because the decision to award the contract to Comensura was made by Council officers and not by elected Members."
So much for the facts. I wonder if anybody has asked the County Hall trade unions what they think?
No comments:
Post a Comment