Members of the workers’ union Unison have claimed that they are willing to take Northamptonshire’s County Council to court over its latest outsourcing plans.

In reaction to prolonged austerity measures and sizeable cuts to local government funding, the council is in the process of adopting an innovative new outsourcing model where it acts as a smaller core council commissioning a group of “specialist social enterprises”. This will reduce the council’s core staff to 150 people, while 4,000 will be transferred to four new service providers, all of which will be created and part-owned by the council. In December, the Council created the first of these four companies – First for Wellbeing – which will be responsible for weight management programmes, smoking cessation clinics and debt advice, along with other services.

A recent Local Government Association report judged that, from the 27 county councils in England, Northamptonshire is currently the “least able to fund itself”. This “Next Generation Model” of outsourcing is expected to save the council up to £150 million by 2020.

Unison members are unhappy that these structural changes never went to a referendum. And while workers have been guaranteed job security, the union is concerned that the newly created companies could be outbid for council services in a few years’ time.

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