Wednesday 3 November 2010

Bonkers Barnet Council have found a new way to waste your money

It just gets worse. Most local authorities have a website. I just found out that Barnet have TWO. They have this one and they have this one.  Each one costs money to register, maintain and design. Why they can't just put a page on their I know not. Hang on, Hang on what's this I see on the new WWW.ONEBARNET.CO.UK website (the second of the two). It has a nice picture of Nick Walkley with the title - Chief Executive  on it, but what is the address at the bottom? " Registered office: 71 Victoria Street, Westminster, London, SW1H OXA Registered in England. A part of the Capita Group Plc. Veredus 2009". Has the London Borough of Barnet been flogged off to Capita?  Here's the screenshot


Now you may ask how I came across the advert. Well as I made my way home this evening, I had a look at the Guardian Society supplement page 9. Now at the weekend, I was talking to several people who work at
Barnet Council about the cuts facing Childrens services. It sounds awful. They were telling me that many front line staff are facing redundancy and many people in vital roles will go. I was quite disturbed by much of what I heard. Then I open the Society section and read that Barnet Council are recruiting an "Assistant Director - Childrens Social Care" on £91,000 a year - Here's the full details - http://www.onebarnet.co.uk/Background - As ever in top heavy Barnet, they are more than happy to cut at the front line, spend money like water at the top and set up even more absurd websites with your cash. The Hendon Times reports that Council Leader Lynne Hillan reportedly said at a Council meeting last night "You will not teach me anything about incompetence" for once I agree with her

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://www.onebarnet.co.uk/Contact

http://www.veredus.co.uk/ ?

Contact

To discuss a particular role advertised on this site, please check the 'How to Apply' page for the role you are interested in and contact a member of that team.

For any general queries regarding this website, please contact:

Steve Guest
Veredus
17 Rochester Row
London
SW1P 1RP

steve.guest@veredus.co.uk

Click here to leave feedback via this site

curiouser and curiouser....

baarnett said...

Veredus is a trading name of Capita Business Services Ltd. Registered in England No. 2299747. Part of The Capita Group Plc.

Domain name:
onebarnet.co.uk


Registrant: Daniel Moll

Trading as: Capita Resourcing Ltd

Registrant's address: 17 Rochester Row, SW1P 1RP

Registered on: 06-May-2010

Well, fancy that.

Mr Reasonable said...

They have used this micro site for previous recruitment posts including for finance people. Between July and September 2010 the Council paid Veredus £60,956.50for staff advertising along with £20,746.79 for interim management and £5,148.00 for "other services". It is somewhat ironic that the council talks about making savings when they seem to spend so much on recruitment consultants. I would also note that they just athorised a minimum of £50,400 to be paid to Martin Ward Andersen (part of the Randstad Group)for recruitment of finance personnel. When will this spending end!