A SHAKE-UP at the top of Bradford Council is set to save the taxpayer more than £180,000 a year.

The number of senior managers is to be cut by two, as six posts are merged into four.

And while the opposition Conservative group are broadly supportive of the Labour-led council’s move, the Liberal Democrats have said it doesn’t go far enough and are demanding a full review of executive pay.

Bradford Council’s leader, Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe, said this was the latest of a series of savings in senior management.

She said: “Since 2010 when Labour took over in Bradford, we’ve reduced senior management by 35 per cent.

“We’ve also taken 300 management posts out lower down the organisation which has saved £9.5 million.

“This focus on driving down costs is because Labour in Bradford wants to preserve as many frontline services as possible.”

Councillor Simon Cooke, leader of the Conservative group, said: “It’s the management restructure they should have done four years ago. The saving is very, very welcome.”

But he said his group believed some of the extras included in the six-figure salary packages of two new strategic director posts, such as membership of professional bodies and car loan offers, were overly generous.

Councillor Jeanette Sunderland, leader of the Liberal Democrats, called for a full review of senior management pay, saying: “I’m glad to see we are saving money on salaries but still worried that we are at the top end of all the salary scales in the UK.

“It’s a time when the council needs to look at where it spends all of its money.”

The restructure will leave the council with 22 staff at assistant director level or above, as well as two senior lawyers.

The roles to be scrapped are those of finance director, strategic director of regeneration, strategic director of environment and sport, assistant director of communications, assistant director of commissioning and procurement and assistant director of policy, programme and change.

They will be replaced by four new roles: strategic director of corporate services, strategic director of place, assistant director for the office of the chief executive and assistant director of finance and procurement.

The new strategic director of corporate services will also manage people such as the city solicitor and director of human resources, who previously reported to chief executive Kersten England.

A report by Ms England says she currently manages 12 people, which is not the usual arrangement in councils, adding that it is “important that any chief executive of a large and complex organisation devotes the overwhelming majority of their time to strategic management responsibilities”.

The two new strategic directors will be paid between £131,483 and £137,845 - a salary which needed the approval of the full council earlier this week.

Labour voted in favour of the salary packages, while the Liberal Democrats voted against and the Conservatives abstained.

Assistant directors get paid between £69,606 and £91,023 a year.

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