Local council doing private/contracting work

[walkerboys]

Our council tree team also do private works, my council tax is underwriting my competition, that said I've never had a customer who's used them or had em in to quote

 

It's the tree officer that's pushing it every tpo job that he approves gets a quote sent with the confirmation

[Macaulay]

Don't forget the possibility of creative accounting.

 

Private job overruns= mark it down as council time.

[Shane]

This has to be questionable in terms of using public funding for commercial gain???

 

Our council has just backed down on charges to dump certain items at the municipal tip.

Apart from the increase cost of deling with fly tipping (though I never thought flies were that difficult to clean up) they were apparently challenged on some legal issues and caved in. So they are not always as right as they think they are.

[johnp]

It's the tree officer that's pushing it every tpo job that he approves gets a quote sent with the confirmation

 

 

That's a lot worse than the Taunton lot then! I'd be seriously pissed off,

[Tom D]

These practices are wrong on so many levels. The TPO thing just has to be illegal in some way, its certainly not fair.

[Steven P]

I've no real problem with this in principle - of the council guys are sitting about drinking tee waiting for a council job to do then why not contract them out and get their wages paid for a bit?

 

So long as.....

They charge the market rate for the work

They get asked to quote via the usual means rather than using inside information that only the council have access too

They operate at the same or better standards than their competition

 

biut if they can compete failry and put some cash back in no problem.

 

 

 

But I fear that the compete fairly might be a problem

[Khriss]

it's nothing to the scale of councils investing in hedge funds and getting in consultants to 'manage' pension funds for their employees - they are now businesses in their own right and it was always the intent to privatize all services that have a public use ..... K ...( Thanks Thatcher ......)

[Tom D]

I've no real problem with this in principle - of the council guys are sitting about drinking tee waiting for a council job to do then why not contract them out and get their wages paid for a bit?

 

So long as.....

They charge the market rate for the work

They get asked to quote via the usual means rather than using inside information that only the council have access too

They operate at the same or better standards than their competition

 

biut if they can compete failry and put some cash back in no problem.

 

 

 

But I fear that the compete fairly might be a problem

If the guys are sitting around drinking tea, get them paid off FFS! LA's are shutting libraries and public toilets and social care is massively underfunded, the money could be well spent elsewhere.

 

It costs an LA at least £300k a year to run a full time 4 man arb squad (i know it sounds a lot but I have that from a senior LA manager). My local council got rid of their arb squad years ago and just use private contractors when they need to. It must have saved them a fortune.

[aspenarb]

Let them get on with it, it will all end in tears just like anything the council try and do.

 

Bob

[walkerboys]

If the guys are sitting around drinking tea, get them paid off FFS! LA's are shutting libraries and public toilets and social care is massively underfunded, the money could be well spent elsewhere.

 

It costs an LA at least £300k a year to run a full time 4 man arb squad (i know it sounds a lot but I have that from a senior LA manager). My local council got rid of their arb squad years ago and just use private contractors when they need to. It must have saved them a fortune.

 

My mate in the council said all in there 3 man team costs £400k to run a year