On 2006-12-15 22:08:00 +0000, Frank Erskine
said:

On Fri, 15 Dec 2006 20:08:56 +0000, Andy Hall
wrote:

On 2006-12-15 19:02:49 +0000, John Beardmore said:



I'm not sure I agree, but as you don't seem to realise what LA staff do
do, or to know how much it costs, it's hard to take your protestations
about it seriously.

The council tax payers where I live are taking it very seriously and
are pushing for detail of what each department actually does do and the
costs involved, including the duplications that arise from the use of
management consultants.

I thought that every LA publishes performance indicators on the web,
together with estimated and revised costing for each directorate.
Mine certainly does.

They should, but the level of detail isn't there.

For example, my local highways department, in order to carry out a
survey for traffic planning and distribution hired an outside firm to
do most of the work while staff members sat in the office. This was
unknown to most councillors until they were made aware of it. It's
but one example of paying twice because those employed to do the work
are lazy, incompetent or both. In terms of the published figures £X
appeared as opposed to the £X/2 that it should have cost.