A former Lincolnshire County Council CEO who left the role after four months will leave his post at St Helen’s Council – after five months.
Keith Ireland left Lincolnshire County Council in November with £292,263 in salary and compensation payments.
His split from Lincolnshire came through a “mutual decision”, bosses explained previously.
He then joined St Helen’s Council as a consultant interim assistant chief executive in April.
In an email to his own party, seen by Local Democracy Reporters, Labour leader of St Helen’s Council David Baines said: “Keith Ireland will no longer be employed as a consultant by the council.
“His contract has been terminated and he has agreed not to work his notice period.”
The council stated his contract “came to a natural end”.
Mr Ireland was due to leave the authority when his original contract came to an end in July. His contract was extended while the council continued to fill the assistant chief executive role permanently.
The length of his previously agreed contract extension was not disclosed. Nor were details of any compensation packages, if any, awarded for the contract termination.
His position, which the council agreed to make permanent in July, would have come with a salary of up to £110,000.
Mr Ireland’s consultancy service reportedly cost St Helen’s Council £930 a day according to a Freedom of Information request by the Local Democracy service in July.
Leader of the council, Councillor Martin Hill, and his former chief executive, Keith Ireland reportedly clashed on a number of issues.
He is not the only one leaving the authority. Its current chief executive will also be heading out the door this week.
St Helen’s authority officials say the two are not linked.
Mr Ireland’s Lincolnshire County Council salary equated to around £1,234 a day.
When he was hired he was contracted to £178,500 salary a year for his role as CEO and his pay-off included £133,875 compensation for loss of employment.
Mr Ireland was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s New Year honours list for his services to local government in relation to his previous work at City of Wolverhampton Council, where he was managing director from 2014 until 2018.
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A 38-year-old man from a North Lincolnshire village charged with murder will face an eight-day trial later this year.
Emergency services were called at 4.23am on Saturday, July 2 to reports that a man was seriously injured on South Parade in central Doncaster.
The 28-year-old victim was taken to hospital but was sadly pronounced dead a short time later.
A post-mortem examination found that he died of injuries to his head, chest and abdomen.
Formal identification of the victim is yet to take place, South Yorkshire Police said earlier this week.
Steven Ling, 38, of Park Drain, Westwoodside in North Lincolnshire, has been charged with murder and was remanded in custody to appear at Doncaster Magistrates Court on Monday, July 4.
Ling later appeared at Sheffield Crown Court on Tuesday, July 5 for a plea and trial preparation hearing.
No pleas were entered during the hearing, but an eight-day trial was set for November 28, 2022. Ling has now been remanded into custody until the next hearing.
The Lincolnite went on a ride-along with a Lincolnshire Police officer from the force’s Roads Policing Unit (RPU), which aims to disrupt criminals’ use of the roads and reduce the number of serious and fatal accidents.
The team will support the county response including local policing, neighbourhood policing and criminal investigation too.
Operations first began in Grantham in January this year and started in Louth earlier this week with a sergeant and nine PCs based in both locations.
The Lincolnite went out on a ride-along with PC Rich Precious from Lincolnshire Police’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
PC Rich Precious has been a police officer for 22 years after joining the force in 2000 and he recently rejoined the Roads Policing Unit, working out of Louth.
PC Precious, who also previously worked as a family liaison officer for road deaths for 16 years, took The Lincolnite out in his police car to the A1 up to Colsteworth and then back to Grantham. He described that particular area as “one of the main arterial routes that goes through Lincolnshire”.
PC Rich Precious driving down the A1 up to Colsterworth. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
Speaking about the new Roads Policing Unit, he said: “It’s intelligence led policing, it’s targeted policing in areas that have been underrepresented in terms of police presence, on the roads certainly, over a number of years.
“We’re hoping that the development of this unit will help address that balance, and look towards using the ANPR system to prevent criminals’ use of the road, and to identify key areas or routes where there’s a high percentage of people killed or seriously injured on the road, what we commonly refer to as KSI.
PC Precious is helping to keep the roads safer in Lincolnshire. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
When asked if he thinks the new team will help reduce the number of serious and fatal accidents in the county, he added: “That’s what the the unit designed for. Sadly, in Lincolnshire our road network does seem to incur a number of those KSI accidents year on year, and we need to reduce that.
“I’ve worked additionally in my roles as a family liaison officer on road death for 16 years, so I’ve seen first hand the impact that road death has on families and victims families.
“I know it’s important that we try and reduce those because, it’s very sad to see how a fatal road traffic collision can affect a family and the victims of that family.”
Marc Gee, Inspector for Lincolnshire Police’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite
Marc Gee, Inspector for the Roads Policing Unit, told The Lincolnite: “Every day there will be officers on duty from both teams and they’ll cover the whole county or the county’s roads.
“Eventually, we’ll have nine police cars and we’ve got six motorbikes. We’ll be utilising them with as many officers as we can every day basically to make our roads safer and enforce against the criminals who feel like it’s okay to come into the county and use our road for criminal purposes.”
Lincolnshire’s Police and Crime Commissioner Marc Jones at the launch of the force’s Roads Policing Unit. | Photo: Steve Smailes for The Lincolnite