This news is so bad, that at Liverpool it has to be true
- Details
- Published: Friday, 09 August 2024 14:39
Ten CEOs sacked by the same Mayor in eight years, a current investigation into the Council by OLG, a damning report, legal action by the Council to prevent it continuing and a Minister for Local Government determined to conduct a public investigation of the Council and put in an administrator.
The OLG Interim Report being contested by the Council found maladministration, nepotism, poor financial decisions and concerns about destroyed documents as part of the investigation.
Still, it’s surprising the Council is refusing to answer the relatively simple questions we have asked.
Built as a public project in Liverpool’s CBD, the Council’s Liverpool Civic Place is a 10 storey building and library, car park, intended to accommodate a good proportion of the Council staff. Normally, a decision by Council to build its own Administrative Centre, follows public consultation, and, in its fit out, significant input from staff to ensure optimum working conditions for the future.
Not so at Liverpool. Whether it’s the rapid turnover of CEOs, sacked by the Mayor under the senior staff contract, or whether there are secrets that really can’t be revealed, we thought we were asking pretty straightforward questions. There was no consultation with staff who were provided four weeks’ notice of moving into premises that they were only then allowed to inspect. And they were unsuitable. Massive, shared desks, described as either “workbenches” or “dining tables”, intended to seat eight employees, four a side, knees knocking, no room, with an impenetrable barrier of computer screens down the middle, like some dystopian fantasy. No shading or sun protection from the westerly sun, no parking on-site, which for EHOs and building surveyors doing inspections twice a day, 25 minutes or so walking time between the office and the car park. Hopeless.
The current acting CEO has agreed to spend more public monies removing the workbenches, replacing them with individual sit/stand desks, some undertakings about screening, not yet installed and summer is approaching, and still no solution to the car parking.
Described by the Acting Chief People Officer as “extensive consultation with staff from the inception of the project to completion” the only internal communications the Council could provide were those dated from 14 February this year about the impending move, but they included the critical date of 26 March 2024, when employees saw the site for the first time, before moving in on 6 April.... Seven days’ notice, into a poorly thought out and off the shelf design that satisfied no-one.
We tried to explain the concept of consultation to the acting CEO Jason Breton, who responded “Council will not engage in any further dialogue about the past relocation to Scott Street”. When we responded, he asked to be referred to when he had said that...
So we filed a GIPA application, which is being processed. In the meantime we were told the decisions about how the floor would be laid out and designed were made by a previous ELT - meaning person or persons unknown - and that the current Directors were shown the floors when they were already fitted with furniture and computer connections and everything else, and asked to choose their own floor!
That’s more than we had been told, but there is a public interest here and it shouldn’t be confidential. If it was designed and resolved by the Mayor, they should say so, if it was designed by the building company which was doing everything, then someone must’ve signed off on that being the process. Who was it?
And who was responsible for the decision to leave employees in the dark until days before they were forced to move in?