Exclusive - Aussie staff taken on to beat shortfall

Ben Lee, Planning, 1 August 2008

Council staff headed down under in May to interview 20 candidates. Four planners have now swapped either Melbourne or Sydney for the south London borough.

The initiative cost £61,000 in travel, visas and relocation expenses but the council hopes that it can save £80,000 a year if the scheme proves successful.

Cabinet member for planning Jason Perry said recruiting planners at the local authority has been a problem for several years. "It is a novel approach for the planning profession and I am delighted that it appears to have paid off," he said.

Perry added that the high short-term cost of international recruitment is more efficient in the long term. A temporary member of staff costs the council £205 a day compared with £162 a day for permanent staff.

The recruits are tied to two-year contracts and arrive in Croydon later this summer. Their packages include a one-way flight and £1,000 relocation expenses.

The council chose Australia for its international recruitment drive because it felt that skills learned under its planning system will transfer readily to the UK.

Two officers flew out with the aim of recruiting up to eight staff and the services of an international recruitment firm were employed.

The move comes after a Commons communities and local government committee inquiry warned last week that long-term staff shortfalls in the planning system could lead to government targets for housing delivery being missed (Planning, 25 July, p1).

Previous research commissioned by London Councils into the recruitment of planners revealed that 17 per cent of posts in the capital's boroughs were occupied by temporary staff. The majority of these had come to the capital from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.