A FORMER senior officer at Monmouthshire County Council (MCC) received a five figure pay-off despite being given a new job within the council and working for an additional two years following his redundancy from the original position.

Andrew Keep, former corporate director of lifelong learning and education, had his post made redundant in 2010, and was allocated a different job title of chief officer for children and young people.

Once his employment came to an end last year, he received a £75,000 pay-off for his initial role.

Councillor for the Shirenewton ward, Graham Down, said: "These figures may not be at BBC levels but they're pretty staggering amounts for local government officers, particularly people at or approaching retirement age and, in at least one case, for people who were still around for two years after the pay-off was agreed.

"Local residents will obviously be asking why these excessively generous payments were sanctioned from their council tax, and I call upon those involved to come clean."

A Monmouthshire County Council spokesperson said that the payment was made in complete transparency and was all published online.

"In March 2010, Monmouthshire County Council agreed a comprehensive restructure of its management team that resulted in net savings of over £1million per annum," they said.

"As part of this, the three existing corporate director posts were made redundant, including the corporate director for lifelong learning and leisure.

"We were keen to see continuity in our education provision, particularly as the then post holder was leading on the creation of the Gwent wide Education Attainment Service, which was recently held up by the Welsh Government as the model for the implementation of such services around the rest of Wales.

"The post holder therefore agreed not to leave immediately, but to defer his redundancy for two years and take on the newly-created role of chief officer children and young people, which had the education responsibilities that the corporate director post had, but a smaller salary.

"This was confirmed in an Individual Member Decision on 14th July 2010.

"The post holder left the authority in July 2012 and received the redundancy payment deferred from 2010."