Latest news with #MaxCaller
ITV News
22-07-2025
- Business
- ITV News
Commissioner Max Caller brought in to oversee £300m in cuts to Birmingham's services to step down
The lead commissioner of Birmingham City Council, who has been overseeing £300m of cuts to council services over the last two years, is stepping down from his role. Max Caller, who has been referred to by campaigners across the city as 'Max the Axe', has announced plans to retire. He was sent in by the Government in 2023 to make hundreds of millions of pounds worth of cuts to services after the authority effectively declared bankruptcy. He will be replaced by Tony McArdle OBE, who is the former chief executive of Lincolnshire County Council, and Wellingborough Council. He also led the recent intervention at Nottingham City Council to help solve their financial problems two years ago. It's understood Mr Caller has written to deputy prime minister Angela Rayner confirming his retirement comes in the midst of a hugely damaging bin strike in the city, which is understood to have cost the council and taxpayers £4 million. Mr Caller had said last year that he intended to step down as soon as he felt the council's recovery and improvement was secure. He had said it would be a "disaster" if he stayed on for longer as it would show the council was not getting a statement Jim McMahon, minister for local government and regional devolution at the Ministry of Housing, Local Government and Communities has said: 'Max Caller has made a significant contribution to local government throughout his career including leading efforts to put Birmingham City Council on a sustainable footing. "We thank him for his work and wish him well in his retirement."While the city's recovery remains fragile, marked progress was made under his leadership including developing a stable medium-term financial plan, making progress towards resolving the outstanding equal pay situation, and re-implementing the Oracle IT programme."The government's priority is to ensure this work continues."I am confident that will be the case under the new lead commissioner Tony McArdle OBE who brings a huge range of experience to the role having been a well-respected council chief executive and leading interventions at other local authorities." His departure comes just one day after campaigners lost their legal battle over his decision to shut four day centres in the city for people with disabilities: Beeches GOLDD, Fairway, Harborne, and Heartlands. Mr Caller had blocked an attempt by councillors to scrutinise the controversial decision. The closures were part of a wider effort to address a £1.95 million budget gap for 2024–25 and £3.35 million in 2025–26. Following the cabinet's decision to close the centres, six councillors sought to have it reviewed by a scrutiny committee through the formal 'call-in' process. But Max Caller overruled them, blocking further examination by the scrutiny Mr Caller well, the council leader, Councillor John Cotton, said: "I want to place on record our best wishes to Max for his retirement and I have thanked him for his valuable contribution in helping Birmingham's improvement over the past two years."I have this morning also received a letter from the Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, Jim McMahon MP. The Minister has informed us that he has appointed Tony McArdle OBE as the new Lead Commissioner at Birmingham City Council."I am clear that the council still needs external support and the challenge of critical friends, but we need to ensure that they are aligned to our shared priorities as we move to the next stage of the council's improvement journey."We are very keen to continue the pace of progress and ensure it does not slow down during these changes. That is why work on producing next year's budget continues at pace." Since being appointed by the then Secretary of State Michael Gove in October 2023, Mr Caller has overseen a string of major cuts to the council's services. As commissioner, his role included ensuring financial sustainability was delivered, closing budget gaps, agreeing changes to the authority's operating model to ensure financial sustainability.
BBC News
22-07-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Birmingham City Council's lead commissioner retires with immediate effect
The man in charge of fixing Birmingham City Council's finances has Caller was appointed as Birmingham's lead commissioner after the council declared effective bankruptcy in 2023. The authority has since been caught up in a long-running bin strike although Mr Caller has said he has not been involved in negotiations to end tribute, local government minister Jim McMahon said Mr Caller had made a significant contribution to local government throughout his will be replaced on Wednesday by Tony McArdle OBE, a former chief executive of Lincolnshire County Council and Wellingborough Council, among other appointments. Mr Caller had announced his decision on Tuesday morning with immediate effect, council leader John Cotton said, and thanked him for his valuable contribution in helping Birmingham's progress."My message to the public is that changes in personnel will not change the core mission or allow a change of direction that puts at risk any of the progress we have made over the last two years," he said Birmingham's recovery remained "fragile" but "marked progress" had been made under Caller's included developing a stable medium-term financial plan, making progress towards resolving the outstanding equal pay situation, and re-implementing the Oracle IT minister stated the government's priority was to ensure this work continued, and it was confident this would be the case under Tony letter confirming Mr McArdle's appointment as lead commissioner highlights the fact the council is in the "midst of a dispute in its waste services" and has a "demanding improvement journey ahead." The city council's Conservative opposition leader Robert Alden said the party wished Mr Caller all the best for the future, but it was now clearer than ever that the council needed a change of administration."Since Labour declared themselves effectively bankrupt, all three statutory officers have been replaced; now, the lead commissioner has been replaced," he Caller and the rest of the commissioners had done "a good job in shining a light on many of the cultural and systemic failures that we have been calling out for years," he will be lead commissioner from 23 July 2025 to 31October 2028. Follow BBC Birmingham on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
Telegraph
18-07-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
Birmingham council boss received £469k as authority went ‘bankrupt'
The former chief executive of Birmingham City Council received £469,000 during the year she quit the effectively bankrupt authority. Council accounts for the year 2023-2024 revealed Deborah Cadman was given £130,194 as compensation 'for loss of office' on top of a salary of £269,750 and pension contributions of £68,961. The accounts also showed she had received a £25,000 pay rise at the start of 2023. At the time of her departure, the council said she had not received a 'golden handshake', or settlement payment beyond her salary entitlements. It comes after figures revealed the number of Birmingham City Council staff earning more than £100,000 has tripled in three years. There are now 57 people at the struggling council earning six-figure salaries, compared with 19 in 2022. The council this week published its amended accounts for 2021-22 and overdue accounts for 2022-23 and 2023-24, alongside its accounts for the 12 months to April 2025. Ms Cadman's departure in March 2024 was described at the time as a resignation. The council was under the oversight of government-appointed commissioners, led by Max Caller, who had responsibility for hiring and firing senior officers. Since her departure Mr Caller has described the council he walked into, with Cadman at the helm, as ' failing in many areas ' and said that senior leaders failed to respond with sufficient urgency to the massive challenges. Cadman's appointment in March 2021 was hailed as a historic moment – she was the first person of colour to lead the country's biggest unitary authority. Under her leadership the council put on the Commonwealth Games in 2022, while the city's Labour politicians hailed a 'golden decade' ahead. But behind the scenes things were falling apart, with multiple major projects running into huge problems alongside a poor culture of governance and secrecy. It was also on her watch that equal pay liabilities continued to build, especially in a badly run waste service. Prior to her departure she said she had been let down by senior colleagues with oversight of finances and operations, including the waste service, and had inherited a toxic environment. In a Birmingham Live interview she had accepted 'some responsibility' for the mess the council was in but also pointed the finger at past senior members of the council team who had 'not done the right thing'. When she quit she claimed she was going by choice and had always intended to leave once the council was on the road to improvement and recovery. In a statement she said: 'It has been the honour of my life to be the chief executive of the city in which I was born and raised. I wish my colleagues every success in transforming the council into one that this great city deserves.' The council said: 'Deborah Cadman was employed as chief executive of Birmingham city council until the end of March 2024. The £469,000 in the majority comprises her normal salary and pension contributions for that role earned up to her departure date. 'She was paid contractual notice pay on her exit from Birmingham of £130,000. No other severance payments or pension contributions were made in relation to her exit. 'There are processes in place that set out the framework for senior salary levels and that ensure value for money, but it is important that we are able to recruit and retain experienced experts to implement policy and oversee performance across a range of vital services.
The Guardian
12-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Birmingham council faces legal action over decision to close adult day centres
Legal action is being taken after commissioners sent to oversee Birmingham council blocked scrutiny of a controversial decision to close adult day centres. An application for a judicial review has been brought in the names of Robert Mason, 63, and Jenny Gilbert, 50, who attend day centres for adults with physical and learning disabilities in the city. The legal challenge argues there was an overreach by the commissioners, in breach of the Local Government Act, when they refused to allow three separate applications by elected council members to 'call in' a cabinet decision to close four day centres for further scrutiny. James Cross, acting on behalf of Mason, his uncle, who attended a day centre in Harborne for 45 years, said the commissioner had 'made a mockery of local government' by overriding the established process and preventing full scrutiny of the closures. 'From our point of view, the local democratic process was removed because of their direct intervention,' said Cross. 'Scrutiny is essential for local democracy, especially when a cabinet decision is made by 12 people out of 101 councillors.' After the council declared itself effectively bankrupt in 2023, the government appointed a team of six commissioners to oversee its daily running for up to five years, until October 2028. Collectively they have been paid nearly £2m in fees and expenses by the council since being appointed. They are led by Max Caller, nicknamed 'Max the Axe' for his tough approach to pushing through cuts at cash-strapped local authorities. There was an outcry in March when four of the nine council-run adult day centres in the city were closed as part of swingeing budget cuts, with the MP for Birmingham Edgbaston, Preet Kaur Gill, saying the commissioners had 'shut down democratic scrutiny' by refusing the call-in requests. Caller said there was 'pre-decision scrutiny' over the day centre closures, and it would have cost the council £100,000 a month to delay. Cross said: 'I put forward a proposal for Harborne day centre where it would be turned into a community hub, so that outside of the day centre hours it could be used to generate income. They just didn't want to know. 'There's no innovative thinking, it's just straightforward, yes, we'll cut that. But it's short-term gain in terms of finance, for long-term pain, because you're just kicking the situation further down the road.' A court hearing on 21 July will determine whether the judicial review can go ahead. With increasing numbers of councils struggling financially, there are now commissioners in place at six other local authorities: Croydon, Tower Hamlets, Nottingham, Slough, Woking and Thurrock. Jonathan Carr-West, the chief executive of the Local Government Information Unit (LGIU), said the commissioner model was 'very much the favoured mechanism of the last government and is being continued by this government' to intervene in struggling councils. 'When people say that it takes away local democratic control, that's true, that's explicitly what it does because, in a way, the point is to say: we're going to send in people who don't have to worry about being elected and can make the really tough decisions,' he said. 'In Birmingham, where they've entirely defunded cultural services, where they've cut children's services by a further 25%, local politicians just wouldn't be able to make those tough choices. [Commissioners] are not accountable or invested in the long term.' Sign up to Headlines UK Get the day's headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion He said commissioners 'very much operate within a certain managerial paradigm, and they're not intended to be there to innovate'. Analysis by the Local Government Chronicle last year found that almost 70% of commissioners sent into struggling councils were male and more than a quarter had not worked in local government for four years or more. Carr-West said the use of commissioners was not a 'scalable' solution to the problems facing councils. 'It feels like a sticking plaster approach, and possibly one that stores up problems for the future, rather than actually a real transformation process,' he said. 'We still have a third of councils across the country saying: 'If nothing changes in the way we're funded, we will go bust within the next five years'. 'Well, you can send Max Caller to two or three councils, but you can't send him to a third of the councils in the country. It can't be a system-wide approach to rescuing local government.' In June, the local government minister, Jim McMahon, said he was minded to send commissioners to run Croydon council as its finances were 'deteriorating rapidly'. The move led to a backlash among councillors, with the executive mayor, Jason Perry, saying 'unelected Labour commissioners could override local democratic decisions, including forcing tax hikes and cuts'. The commissioners in Birmingham have been contacted for comment.
The Independent
14-04-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
What will finally put an end to the Birmingham bin strike?
Days after the deputy prime minister, Angela Rayner, called in the army to assist in the logistics side of the Birmingham bin strike (rather than collecting rubbish), after six weeks out, and even after an improved offer from the council, the Birmingham bin strike is to continue. The latest strike ballot is overwhelmingly – 97 per cent – in favour of further industrial action. The build-up of rubbish, increasingly unsanitary conditions and the onset of warmer weather have increased the pressure on all involved to reach a settlement. Even now, it will cost £200m for a clean-up. The situation is turning critical from a public health point of view… Whose fault is the strike? Hard to say. No one forced Unite at the point of a gun to call a strike, nor the workers to democratically vote for such a long dispute. They do, however, feel that the changes in the pay and conditions they were being asked to accept were intolerable – Unite has claimed a planned restructuring of Birmingham's refuse service would see 50 workers lose £8,000 a year and about 20 lose £2,000 per annum, and put 170 jobs at stake. Now, it adds that the future of the drivers is also in jeopardy. The council denies this, saying only 17 workers would be affected and 'no worker needed to lose a penny'. The latest offer included temporary pay protection and a compensatory lump sum for affected workers – but it's not enough. What's behind it? Birmingham is bust. It applied for the municipal equivalent of protective bankruptcy in 2023, as a result of which the then minister responsible appointed commissioners to take over and sort things out. The lead commissioner is Max Caller, with half a century of local government experience behind him. Like all local authorities, Birmingham has had its problems, but the immediate and principal cause of its financial stress was a back-dated equal pay claim that amounted to £760m, way beyond its resources even if it was the best-run organisation in the Western world. The costs of running the successful 2022 Commonwealth Games have also added to the strains. Although Birmingham councillors are still running things and negotiating with Unite on the refuse workers' pay, according to Sharon Graham, Caller is 'the power behind the throne and pulling the strings in Birmingham. He, along with the council's management and leadership, is responsible for the ongoing rubbish dispute. The commissioners and the council have had months to resolve this dispute but have singularly failed to do so. Birmingham residents need to be asking why they have to pay through the nose for this mess. They deserve better than this.' Why send the army in? It's not that unusual for the military to find itself obliged to answer a call for 'military aid for civilian authorities '. The most long-lasting such exercise was the deployment of British troops in Northern Ireland as law and order was breaking down in 1969, 'aid' being quickly converted into suppressing guerrilla warfare. Less lethal but high-profile deployments include acting as firefighters, ambulance drivers and Border Force officials. However, every government has been wary of asking the soldiers to do jobs they are sometimes untrained for, unduly dangerous, or where they risk becoming politicised – scabs and strike-breakers. Now, in the middle of a challenging round of local elections, Rayner must decide whether, in effect, to break the strike by asking troops or contract labour to remove the rotting rubbish – to avoid a serious public health disaster – rats, flies, and cockroaches at large with all that implies. Rayner won't enjoy taking on her comrades – but also can't relish the prospect of the first child to be bitten and infected by an emboldened rat. Who's winning? No one, except maybe some well-nourished Brummie rats. The Conservatives are seeking to make some capital out of the 'mess in Labour-run Birmingham', but there are no elections there until next year (which will prove interesting) and the read-off in the other county councils more generally is weak. National issues are, as usual, more important, and the protest vote seems to be heading for Nigel Farage and Reform UK. Kemi Badenoch is having what she admits is a difficult campaign, so soon after the disaster of last year's general election. Will there be more of this? Yes. Although not as dramatically as Birmingham, which happens to be the largest single local body outside the Greater London Authority, in the coming years, more local councils will find themselves in the hands of the commissioners and making radical cuts to jobs and services – with tough union resistance guaranteed. Rayner, herself a former trade union official, will be very busy just trying to sustain the very minimum functions of local authorities, run by all parties, that have run out of money.
