Staffordshire County Council is to reduce the number of directors on its senior leadership team in a cost-cutting move to meet unprecedented financial pressure, .
In its draft budget for 2019-20 published by the County Council in September, proposals were set out to close a £35m shortfall in its budget next year. One of those measures will be to reduce the number of directors from five to four.
The current roles of Director of Strategy, Governance and Change, (held by John Tradewell), and Director of Finance and Resources (Andy Burns) will be deleted. They will be replaced by a new role of Director of Corporate Services. Following a review, and subject to a decision at full council in December, John Tradewell has been recommended by a special committee of councillors to be appointed to the new role of Director of Corporate Services.
The Leader of Staffordshire County Council, Philip Atkins, said: “Having reduced running costs by £240m in the last nine years, we face extremely difficult decisions to meet our legal duty to balance the books next year. To protect front line and universal services, we are making significant savings in the back office, and subject to approval by full council in December, that will start with our senior leadership team.
“Work is underway on a range of cost saving proposals and together with councils across the country, we continue to lobby Government on the urgent need for more funding for adult and children’s social care. We will know the outcome of this when Government announces the funding settlement for councils in England on 6th December.”
