Care contract delays 'will cost Edinburgh £35,000 a week' - council warns

Published on Saturday 21 November 2009 10:19

CITY leaders were today counting the cost of their defeat on care for the city's most vulnerable people.

Housing leader Paul Edie said that the cost to the council of putting the re-tendering of the services on hold would total 35,000 a week.

He said that the new contracts would have provided savings that could have been invested elsewhere. He also warned that the council will face legal action if the re-tendering of the contracts is not now completed.

The Liberal Democrat/SNP administration had wanted to approve the contracts at a meeting this week but was defeated following a stormy debate in the council chambers.

Council officials have now been asked to provide more clarity on a range of issues, including direct payments, before a final vote at a finance meeting in a fortnight.

Cllr Edie warned that if the transfer of the contracts to private firms was cancelled then the council will face legal action from the new providers it had agreements with that could cost it a lot more.

"It will cost 35,000 a week by delaying it because the contracts would save us money for the same volume of service," he said.

"I have never seen a debate where advice has been sought by five senior officers and totally disregarded. We got clear advice and you disregard that number of senior officers at your peril. There was a lack of responsibility in what was carried.

"The officers have put together a tendering process that cherry-picked the best parts of all other tendering exercises. It was a good exercise, was robust and I absolutely defend it.

"I don't see how we cannot award the contracts to those preferred bidders. If they were to take us to court, I don't know how we defend it. This is a mess, principally of the Conservatives' making."

The Labour/Green amendment that was approved called for the backlog of direct payments to be cleared before the finance meeting on 3 December.

Council officials say that 209 direct payments need to be processed. These are normally dealt with at a rate around 11 a month, meaning officials now face a race against time to process them.

Cllr Edie said: "It's not something that can happen quickly. There are specialist checks you need to perform and it is not straightforward."

Meanwhile, Labour councillor Lesley Hinds, who fought against the proposals, said she was awaiting additional information about direct payments and the legal ramifications of stopping the tenders before deciding what to propose at finance committee.

"I am determined that in two weeks we will have a proposal that will address the majority of the concerns," she said.

"There are some people who want us to chuck out the whole tender process, whereas some people will say we can continue if we sort some things out. We need to have all the facts."