Council misleading residents about Cllrs allowances and expenses again.

On June the 12th we published the allowances of all Folkestone & Hythe District Cllrs for the financial year 2020/21.

The Council are omitting the fact, that three Cllrs in the list would be much higher if they were to add in their Oportunitas Allowance. Cllr Patricia Rolfe (Con), Cllr Terence Mullard (UKIP) and Cllr Peter Gane (Con) each recieve an allowance for being directors on the Oportunitas Board. Cllr McConville (Lab) is the only Oportunitas director who doesn’t draw down an allowance for being a director on the Oportunitas board.

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Now what is clear from this document published on the Council’s website is that no Cllr claimed any expenses. As the website says:

Councillors can also claim certain expenses such as the costs of travelling to meetings on official council business.

They can also claim for food if away on official Council business.

However the 2020/21 accounts make three things very clear.

1 – The amount claimed by Cllrs as per the Cllrs allowances webpage, was not as they published £316,867, but was £328,000 an £11,133 pound difference.

2 – The allowances claimed was £318,000 not £316,867 and Cllrs claimed £13,000 more in 2020/21 when compared to the previous financial year.

3 – Cllrs claimed £10,000 pounds in expenses.

So once again, Folkestone & Hythe District Council have placed contradictory information into the public domain.  It’s clear there is no sanity checking undertaken by those in the finance department and those who sign off the information for publication.

The Corporate Director responsible for this is Charlotte Spendley who is the Council’s statutory officer responsible for the money, more commonly known as the section 151 officer.

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Ms Spendley received £105,936  in salary, including fees and allowances, plus £17,824  in pension contributions bringing her total remuneration, including pension contributions to £123,760.

We’ll leave you to decide if Ms Spendley has been promoted to her level of incompetence and if she suffers from the Dunning Kruger Effect

The Dunning-Kruger effect is a type of cognitive bias in which people believe that they are smarter and more capable than they really are. Essentially, low ability people do not possess the skills needed to recognize their own incompetence. The combination of poor self-awareness and low cognitive ability leads them to overestimate their own capabilities.

Whatever you decide, do let Ms Spendley know by sending her a polite email to

charlotte.spendley@folkestone-hythe.gov.uk

The Shepway Vox Team

Dissent is NOT a Crime