Revealed: £300k golden goodbye for senior Coventry council boss

[dutchman]

Brian Walsh was listed as the 11th highest paid council employee in the country last year



Coventry City Council handed over a cheque for almost £300,000 after a senior boss quit his six-figure job with the authority.

Brian Walsh, the council’s former executive director for people, left his post through early retirement in 2015.

Prior to leaving the council, he was earning more than £141,000 a year through a salary of £124,295 and pension contributions.

When Mr Walsh quit he was entitled to a pension pay-off of £295,014 through the West Midlands Pension Fund - a sum which was funded by Coventry City Council.

As a result of the pay out, Mr Walsh was listed by the Taxpayers’ Alliance as the 11th highest paid local authority employee in the country during the 2015/16 financial year with total earnings of £376,939.

He joined Coventry City Council as director of community services in 2009 after four years at national charity Scope, as its director of adult services.

He has also worked in senior management roles in councils across the East Midlands.

Coventry City Council said the decision to allow Mr Walsh to take early retirement would actually save taxpayers money in the long run.

A spokesman for the council said: “Brian Walsh, former executive director for people, left his post in 2015 through retirement.

“As a result a wider reorganisation of the management team in the people directorate took place, with the deletion of a number of senior posts and a reduction in layers of senior management.

“This led to annual savings on senior management salaries in the directorate of between £660,000 and £690,000 from September 2015 compared to October 2014.”

Clarifying how the amount was arrived at, the spokesman added: “It is a sum calculated by, and paid to, the West Midlands Pension Fund, equivalent to the anticipated cost to the fund of the early retirement decision, based largely on the age at retirement, the length of pensionable service and the salary of the individual concerned.

“This one-off cost will be more than funded by the savings identified, which represent an ongoing annual reduction in costs.”

[Melisandre]

No wonder our council tax keeps going up they can afford this but not services.
A man on the radio news said the council is not a business it is the council tax payers who pay and these kind of wages should be cut and provide services they are cutting back on for those people.