Cut waste - not services

This weekend sees the launch of our campaign to highlight the fact that many councils are wasting money needlessly on agency workers and consultants. We have made Freedom of Information requests to all 45 councils in the East Midlands asking how much they spend on agency workers and consultants and we are now ready to expose our findings through the media.

There should be an article about agency workers and consultants' costs in the Nottingham Evening Post on Saturday, followed by a piece on the BBC East Midlands Politics Show.

Then, from Monday, we are are hoping for some coverage in the regional press, local TV and radio. We will be publishing the agency worker and consultants' costs on this blog sometime late on Monday. So if you want to know how much your council spent keep an eye on the blog.

We can assure you that you will raise your eyebrows at some of the costs. The Tories say there needs to be cuts to services and wage freezes to "balance the books." Our findings show that councils shave plenty of scope to be cutting waste rather than jobs and services.