Local government is awash with cash and yet planners are being paid less than ever.
Discuss.
The Home Builders Federation says that local authorities are sitting about £3,000 million (sounds bigger than £3 billion) of developers’ contributions. That’s £10,000 per LA.
But planners’ salaries are going through the floor. The RTPI says that pay has dropped by 30 per cent in real terms since 2005. Nowadays council planners are paid a median salary of £30,000 the same as in 2005.
But that monster inflation means that salaries should now be about £50,000. (By the way, average pay in the UK is £40,000 according to the Office for National (stet) Statistics. That includes everyone from McDonald’s burger flippers to CEOs.)
This also means that there are more and more juniors in planning departments, so it is no wonder that the system is stuck as people with experience head for the sunny uplands of the private sector.
One in four LA planners left between 2013 and 2020. So where did they go? By a weird coincidence, the private sector grew by two-thirds.
So when developers and planning consultants complain that they cannot get a meaningful meeting with a council, the reason is simple: because they are all working for YOU.
Doh! As Homer Simpson puts it so well.
Here’s a radical solution that will not make me popular with anyone.
When the RAF trains a pilot, they lock them with fairly onerous terms – as far as I can see 12 years’ service – so that they cannot just walk out the door every time Micky O’Leary waves his chequebook.
Experience gained by graduates at a council is a public asset and the private sector should cough up when they poach someone. It would be an HR nightmare.
But wait. There are a couple of other solutions.
Next month, fees for major applications will rise by 35 per cent. Let’s reinforce that money – before the bean counters get their paws on it – and reserve it for planners’ pay.
Or why don’t not dig into some of the £3,000 million – imaginative accounting may be needed.
So, get yourself down to the HR department and form an orderly queue.
Have a good weekend.
Tom
by the Planning PR guru 