Croydon (Parliament Politics Magazine) – Croydon Council faces criticism as its agency staffing bill reveals a £726-per-hour consultant hire, raising concerns over spending and public accountability.
With spending on agency staff last year reaching an astounding £53.4 million, the serious concerns expressed over Croydon‘s “runaway” expenditure are well-founded, according to a thorough and in-depth analysis of official council financial accounts done on behalf of this website by certified and experienced accountants.
That is nearly four times the £14 million Croydon Council spent on agency staff in 2021, the year before Conservative Jason Perry was elected as the first executive mayor of the borough on a platform of “fixing the finances.”
Following a highly critical report from the improvement and assurance panel that had been monitoring the council’s management for five years, local government minister Jim McMahon announced last month that the Ministry of Housing, Communities, and Local Government is “minded” to send in Commissioners to take over the management of Croydon’s financially strapped council.
Croydon has £1.4 billion in debt and finds it difficult to make interest payments on it. The government consented earlier this year to provide Croydon another bailout loan, this time for £136 million, which was more than the borough had ever received.
According to the improvement panel’s findings, Croydon Council would completely “collapse” as a result of the enormous overspending in 2024 and council executives’ intentions to borrow their way out of problems during the following four years.
Since the council’s own records indicate a total failure of financial controls and governance, the rapidly increasing expenditure on agency staff—high-rate temporary workers brought in to fill staffing gaps due to recruitment issues—may prove to be one of the first areas for close attention by any Commissioner.
The council’s own records show that a member of Adecco’s own staff approved around £1.4 million in payments made by Croydon Council to one agency.
The council’s head of human resources, Dean Shoesmith, has been given the assistance of a “HR consultant” who is paid £726 per hour, which is just another instance of the financially stressed council spending money like it’s going out of style.
Croydon Council’s 2023–2024 accounts were only made public last month, although the public has limited access to and evaluation of the books, which are available for viewing and commenting until July 11.
However, based on official papers obtained by this website, Inside Croydon’s team of expert number-crunchers has discovered that not much has changed at Fisher’s Folly since the dreadful days when Jo “Negreedy” Negrini was in charge.
Things have simply gotten worse in certain ways. Much worse.
After spending £6 million last year to hire four consulting firms, some of whom are still attending council meetings and briefings, Mayor Perry and Katherine Kerswell, his £204,000-per-year chief executive, have put a lot of trust in “transformation” plans.
“The only thing ever ‘transformed’ at Croydon Council is Council Tax-payers’ money into private companies’ dividends,”
one Katharine Street source said today.
Under Perry’s leadership at the Town Hall, agency personnel spending nearly doubled to £27.8 million in 2022–2023.
Therefore, Kerswell and Perry were spending more council money on temporary agency workers while simultaneously laying off hundreds of municipal employees and making public claims about “savings” and cost reductions.
Croydon Council spent £38.5 million on agency workers in 2023–2024, primarily through Adecco.
That expenditure reached £53.4 million in the most recent fiscal year, 2024–2025, nearly quadrupling the amount spent in 2021. It is likely one of the areas where the council’s spending has gotten “runaway,” according to the reform panel.
Only one month’s agency spend amount—£8.8 million for April—is known for the 2025–2026 fiscal year.
In her own online profiles, Giles describes herself as
“A passionate leader, who focuses on the challenges within business and works to realise practical solutions to support business goals through HR interventions”.
And she self-describes as
“Skilled in Transformation and HR Service redesign; Employee Relations, HR Consulting, Coaching, Executive Coaching, HR Policies, and Training Delivery, supporting start-up organisations in HR development as well as project management and delivery”.
Giles must be a good man. Excellent, excellent. Because according to council records, she has been paid £726 per hour to support Dean Shoesmith, who has served as Kerswell’s council’s HR chief, or “chief people officer,” since 2021. However, if Shoesmith needs an assistant at 700 sovs per hour, you have every right to question what he is getting paid for.
Additionally, our accountants were able to compile a list of top council members who collectively approved spending by agency staff totaling tens of millions of pounds.
However, there are no records of Kimberley Ryan working for Croydon Council inside Croydon.
However, there is a person named Kimberley Ryan who identifies herself as a contract manager with Adecco on her LinkedIn profile.
Our specialists have found that nearly all of the expenditures that Kimberley Ryan allowed in the council papers fall under the category of “adjustments,” frequently in cases when no timesheet code was supplied (marked as “null” in the council data). All of the expenditures were made at hourly rates that seemed suspiciously high.
An employee of a contracting business authorizing payments to her own employers totaling millions of pounds of public funds would be extremely unusual. However, that’s what seems to be going on in Fisher’s Folly under Mayor Jason Perry, Dean Shoesmith, and Katherine Kerswell.
Naturally, Inside Croydon questioned Mayor Perry and Katherine Kerswell about the significant increases in their agency staff spending, why a person named Kimberley Ryan was approving the council’s agency expenditures, and why any council executive director would have to pay £726 per hour to hire a consultant.
Naturally, neither the council’s expensive press office nor Mayor Perry and his chief executive ever bothered to reply.
What are the key points about the agency staff bill?
From £14 million in 2021 to over £53 million in 2024–2025, the council’s agency spending has grown significantly. If the present monthly rate continues, it is predicted to reach over £100 million.
Despite public assertions of cost-cutting and personnel layoffs, agency spending has skyrocketed, adding to the council’s increasing debts, which currently total £1.4 billion.
In this larger context of rising agency expenses, the £726 per hour consulting charge sticks out as an extraordinarily high rate.
Concerns over fiscal management and rising agency spending have prompted the Ministry of Housing, Communities, and Local Government to examine this matter and is thinking of appointing Commissioners to supervise Croydon Council’s budget.