Dundee City Council could be in for another shake-up of its structure as it tries to save more money.
Councillors will be asked next week to approve a series of projects under the Changing for the Future programme (CFTF), which has already seen big changes in the way the council is organised and its services provided.
One of the projects for phase three of CFTF is a review of organisational structure and management layers. Work on this is already under way.
Chief executive David Dorward explained the aim was to consider whether departments need further re-structuring to better deliver services in a more joined-up way, as well as reviewing the numbers and levels of managers within each department.
He said: “The CFTF programme continues to be a driver for change within the council.
“There is an emphasis in considering wider corporate initiatives, as well as focusing on areas where national benchmarking has shown the council’s cost per service to be an outlier compared to comparable authorities.”
Other projects include looking at the scope for social enterprises or the voluntary sector to deliver services instead of the council.
Research will be carried out into what other Scottish local authorities have done and Mr Dorward said he wanted to “explore possibilities” within council departments.
Support for children and families will be looked at to see if departments can cooperate with each other better.
Home care services for the elderly will also come under scrutiny, along with the costs of looked-after children in community and residential settings. The long-term need for offices and other bases across the city will be studied too.
The council is also trying to better target its voluntary early retirement and redundancy (VER) scheme to reduce the number of applicants who end up being told they cannot leave. The scheme has already enabled significant savings to be made.
Marjory Stewart, the council’s corporate services director, said that it would account for £8.2 million out the £12.4m that work done through Changing for the Future would save from this year’s budget.
The last completed round of VER took place a year ago, with 177 people applying. Senior managers looked at each application to see if it made financial sense for each employee to leave and what impact this would have on service delivery.
Only 44 staff were allowed to go at that time, with another 24 cases being deferred. In 105 cases applications were refused and in the remaining cases staff either withdrew their application or rejected an offer.