UNION leaders at West Somerset District Council were calling an urgent meeting this week as the authority confirmed it was seeking voluntary redundancies. Chief executive Tim Howes was adamant that no figure had been put on the number of posts to go and there was no threat of compulsory job losses. But staff are known to fear that, in the wake of the last major round of job cuts four years ago, current levels are already pared to the bone. Local Unison spokesman Linda Sully admitted: "We are concerned. "We don't feel we have the capacity to lose any more staff and a review of levels carried out about six months ago appeared to confirm that. "We are having an urgent meeting about the situation this week." The 140 employees, based at offices in Williton and Minehead, have until next Wednesday to apply for redundancy after being told of the opportunity at the end of January. Mr Howes insisted that the offer was not related to any financial constraints within the council but followed a heavy investment in information technology which had resulted in efficiency savings of around £125,000 - two and a half per cent of the £5 million net revenue budget. "We should be cashing in on those savings," he said. Up to a dozen staff have so far expressed an interest in redundancy, although Mr Howes said it was by no means certain that those seeking it would be successful. It would depend on their particular roles within units and whether the service they provided could be lost. The council has recently axed all its temporary staff, filling in any vacancies by deploying any "spare capacity" within the permanent workforce where necessary. And Mr Howes confirmed that the authority would not be filling the post of planning manager - vacant since the departure of Gareth Symons more than a year ago. His role, which has been carried out by a part-time consultant over the past 12 months, will now be filled in a new partnership arrangement with Sedgemoor District Council. Mr Howes said the council already had a successful similar arrangement with Sedgemoor and neighbouring Taunton Deane Borough Council over building control responsibilities and with other district councils over audit work. He said all staff were now being asked to look at the work they were doing and whether it fitted with the council's priorities. On the community side, these focus on affordable housing, job creation and youth provision, coupled with the council's Destination 06 mission statement where the emphasis is on complete customer satisfaction, efficient resource management, people and organisation and leading the community. Staff will effectively be asked to stop doing any work that does not fit with one or all of the overarching priorities. "There are always different ways of doing things," said Mr Howes. "There may be subtle changes to services but we think we can squeeze out more efficiency." Mr Howes insisted that the budget for the forthcoming 2006-07 financial year was not experiencing any difficulties and that portfolio holders had not been asked to make any cuts. He said the total service budget of around £5 million would remain unchanged but some of the funding would be "realigned" to meet the priorities. l At the same time as asking for voluntary redundancies, the council is advertising for a media and public relations officer with a salary between £20,295 and £26,157. The full-time post would replace the service provided on a consultancy basis by Wellington- based M2S media consultants for the past three years, which has come in for criticism from some councillors and members of the public. In 2004-05 the council paid M2S just under £30,000 and spent a further £9,000 on media services provided by another company, Live PR.

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