Opposition councillor slams £120,000 annual cost of Rotherham Council’s three environmental staff

A freedom of information request revealed that the three members of staff – a climate change manager, principal climate change officer and a climate change officer – have a combined salary between £122,000 and £128,000.

Conservative councillor Joshua Bacon questioned the council’s decision to hire the staff, who will deliver carbon literacy training, during a meeting last month.

Coun Bacon told the local democracy reporting service: “This new, expensive team has also been tasked with ‘ensuring staff understand the impact of single use plastics’.

“They could have put this basic information on an e-bulletin via email to staff, or better yet, use the e-poster system they already have in place, displaying this information on council laptops.

“Not only is the Rotherham taxpayer paying for new climate change staff, they’re also paying for the decreased productivity in staff whilst they’re being trained on something everyone knows already – the impact of single use plastics on our environment.

“We know the impact of single use plastics; we know we must protect our environment.

“However, why should the residents of Rotherham have to endure tax-rise after tax-rise to see their money being wasted?

Councillor Denise Lelliott, cabinet member for jobs and the local economy , said that the staff’s work is “far more than just training in relation to plastics”.

“The council has set two challenging targets in response to the global effort to reduce carbon emissions, these being fully Net Zero through operations (including buildings and its fleet Transport) by 2030, with a further target of becoming Net Zero across the borough by 2040, playing our part in addressing perhaps the biggest challenge facing humanity.

“In our budget two years ago we dedicated funding to help lead this work – prior to this there were no dedicated staff working on the climate change agenda at all. Clearly this work is far more than just training in relation to plastics.

“The climate change programme is recognised as a truly cross cutting delivery and every directorate will have a role to play in identifying opportunities to contribute to the Council’s efforts to meet our targets.”