My Lib Dem colleagues at County Hall and I have criticised the ruling Conservative administration for recruiting a new “Business Manager” post, on a salary of more than £43,000, when at the same time planning hundreds of staff redundancies and millions of pounds of cuts to front line services.

The advert, which has appeared on the Guardian website, seeks to recruit a “skilled networker” to County Hall whose work “will often be politically sensitive”.  The salary offered is £43,638 for a working week of 36 hours, with the promise of a “generous local government salary related pension”.

Surrey County Council is telling its own staff that they are planning significant redundancies, and telling residents to prepare for millions of pounds of cuts and a reduction in services.  It simply cannot be right therefore that at the same time the County Council is recruiting new staff to back office positions whilst children’s centres, Special Educational Needs services and local libraries are all under threat.

The County Council needs to demonstrate ways that it can invest in and transform services to save money, as well as reducing overheads in areas like communications, property and back-room staffing functions. Appointments like this do nothing to reassure me that the Tory administration at County Hall understands the wishes and needs of the residents they purport to serve.