Controversy over Paid Appointment of Ex-Tory Councillor

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Council hits back, calling Eugenie White "ideal  candidate"

A row has erupted over the paid appointment of a former Tory councillor to Hammersmith and Fulham's Audit and Pensions Committee.

Cllr Stephen Cowan, Leader of the Labour Group of Councillors has accused Ms Eugenie White of receiving "bungs" worth over £900. Up until the election on May 6, Ms White was a Conservative Councillor for Ravenscourt Park ward.

Hammersmith and Fulham Council however has hit back, calling Ms White the "ideal candidate" to be co-opted.

Cllr Cowan's Labour colleague PJ Murphy, the newly elected representative for Hammersmith Broadway, has raised concerns about the appointment of Ms White at his first meeting of the Audit and Pensions Committee, which met on June 29.

Cllr Murphy noticed that in the supplementary agenda that the Audit Committee is "asked to confirm the appointment of Ms Eugenie White as a nonvoting co-opted member".

It then asked members to agree to pay her £921 a year to attend four meetings.

Referring to what he describes as a "former Tory Councillor's £230 per meeting bung", Cllr Cowan says: " PJ has worked as a human resources expert all over the world. He rightly asked for an explanation of what skills and knowledge were missing amongst the current committee members; what the process was for encouraging a wide range of applicants with the missing aptitudes; how Ms White was recruited or would fill any of the missing ability gaps amongst the Committee.

"No satisfactory answers were provided."

Cllr Cowan adds: " Previously Hammersmith and Fulham's ruling Conservative Councillors have sought to give themselves unwarranted, inflation busting salary hikes, then the Leader of the Council tried to award himself a secret 14% salary rise.

" But this is the first time they have paid a non-elected Conservative large amounts of public money."

The Labour Opposition are now seeking a review of this appointment.

Hammersmith and Fulham Council however has hit back, saying Ms White's appointment is "not unusual". A council spokesman says: "All of the council's committees have the power to co-opt new members if they feel that there are skills and experience that do not sufficiently exist within the current membership.

" The Audit and Pensions Committee felt that Ms White's twenty years of management and directorship experience working in the investment industry and her extensive knowledge of the investment and pension market made her the ideal candidate to supplement the important work of the panel.

" Co-opted members have been entitled to claim a small allowance for their time and expertise for at least eight years. This is not unusual and is a system replicated in many high performing councils across Britain."

The spokesman also points out that the £921 allowance for co-opted member of committees was agreed by Annual Council on May 26 this year and individual committees cannot decided how much to pay co-opted members.

According to the council, there are five other co-optees on  Scrutiny Committees. They are Michael Pettavel, Head of Randolph Beresford Early Years Centre in W12, Education; Maria Brenton, Chair of HAFAD (Hammersmith and Fulham Action on Disablity), Housing, Health and Adult Social Care; Eleanor Allen of the London Diocesan Board for Schools, Education; and Sue Fennimore and Fiona Cook, both co-opted to Education as Parent Government Representatives.

July 8, 2010