Council austerity not a problem for outgoing Chief Executive

One thing not threatened by any cuts is the fat cat pension of Bristol City Council’s interim Chief Executive GRAHAM ‘SIMPLE’ SIMS.

So keen is incoming Mayor GEORGE FERGUSON to be rid of the bumbling timeserver, he’s agreed – despite Sims only having worked 36 years – to sign him off with the equivalent of forty years’ service so he can get a full gold-plated pension when he takes retirement in March. Quite a nice little earner in the age of austerity for the £150k a year bureaucrat.

It’s yet another piece of good fortune for this chronically over-promoted middle manager Sims. When BRADFORD SUN QUEEN Jan Ormondroyd swanned into Bristol in 2008 to become Chief Executive, the first thing she did was get rid of Sims’s Housing Department boss IAN CRAWLEY, whose above average intellect and competence was considered a dangerous threat in the court of the Sun Queen. It was into this vacuum that the hopelessly lightweight yes-man Sims stepped, to hoover up a £120k salary as well as promotion for fawning over Jan and her strategic leadership friends.

Fast forward two years to 2010 and Jan’s sidekick and pathetic wannabe enforcer JON HOUSE, the former cop turned local authority Deputy Chief Executive, had to urgently enforce his own speedy exit to avoid an embarrassing scandal. And who should pop up to pick up the pieces, as well as a tasty pay rise? Yes – Graham Sims!

By mid-2012 Jan finally had to throw in the towel herself after four years of high spending and low achieving. But who should get the top job (solely on the basis of not being weird, provably bent or Finance boss WILL GODFREY)? Yes, it’s our man Graham – once again on hand to collect a nice little salary bump, now boosting him up to £150k a year. Very handy indeed when you’re only fit for retirement and on a final salary pension scheme.

Following this cast of horrors, we can only speculate on the calibre of candidate GORGEOUS GEORGE has in mind for the Chief Operating Officer position he plans to replace the Chief Executive with.

One thing is certain, though – someone will be (red) trousering a pretty penny. Here’s to austerity!