‘Amber warning’ as Hertfordshire County Council payroll costs rise 8.4%

Hertfordshire County Council’s payroll costs dipped into ‘amber warning’ territory in the third quarter of the current financial year (2024-25), a report revealed.

The figures showed the local authority spent the annualised equivalent of £382.7m on salaries in the third quarter, the annualised equivalent of £29.8m (8.4%) more than in the same period in 2023-24.

A report into HCC’s resources performance in the third quarter of 2024-25 was presented to its resources and performance cabinet panel on Friday (March 14).

Presenting the figures, Paraic McKenna, the council’s head of intelligence improvement and technology, said: “Two of three metrics for the panel to note. The first is on payroll… at £383 million annualised spend.

“Which is, as you know, a known and anticipated level within the IP [Integrated Plan], but it is flagged as amber, simply reflecting the financial pressures the local authority faces, and this is probably the single largest area of spend across all of our staff.”

Other human resources statistics in the report showed an 11.9% voluntary staff turnover in the third quarter, described as ‘stable’ for over two years after peaking at 19% in the last quarter of 2021-22.

An average of 4.4 days were lost to sickness, “steadily reducing” from 5.3 days reported in the first quarter of 2022-23.

The workforce headcount was listed as 1,617, while agency spend was £3.6m – a reduction of £262,000 since the first quarter of 2023-24.