THURROCK Council has added a new highly-paid executive director to its senior management team, taking the number of executive roles, excluding the CEO and assistant CEO to five. The executive payband starts at £160,000.

The council's latest roll call of senior officers, which doesn't give a fully accurate picture of cost as several temporary officers are engaged through agencies who are then paid a premium, shows 28 officers at director or head of service level, with 24 earning more than £100,000.

Eight of the titles currently occupied and described as temporary are likely to have significant further agency costs attached to them.

The most recent Taxpayer's Alliance 'rich list' featured Thurrock Council prominently and quoted at least two directors were agency funded posts, costing the council than £270,000 each.

The disparity and apparent lack of transparency around senior managers' pay is illustrated in the two tables above that show contrasting figures. The 'senior management structure table' shows 24 roles over £100,000, but the accompanying salary table indicates 16.

The most recent confirmed figures show the council employs 2,355 people, at an average salary of £35,557. At least 439 earn more than £50,000. Unions including Unite and GMB say frontline workers at Thurrock Council are paid, on average, between £25,000 and £27,000.

Overall the council still maintains a substantial number of agency or interim staff, to which Martin D'Mello, is the new appointee. His role is Executive Director - Housing Landlord Services.

Thurrock Nub News was notified of the latest appointment by disgruntled staff who pointed to a pre-election promise by Reform, who swept to power in May, to 'lift the hood and look deep into council pay structures.'

The housing department at Thurrock Council has been under scrutiny and recent press releases and focus in reports on cost-saving within it appeared to indicate likely reductions in expenditure and a possible pruning of senior management staff.

And the council appeared to have increased its management knowledge in the housing sector when recently appointing new CEO Debbie West who came to the council with a significant reputation as a specialist in the social housing sector.

She is a previous Executive Director for Resident Services for Southampton City Council, has been a housing director with other unitary and London councils, worked with Homes England to create the Local Government Capacity Centre and was its Director for Transformation from 2019 to 2023. Her most recent job was with the Local Government association as head of its new Council Housebuilding Support Service (CHoSS).

However, the council says it needs even more housing management knowledge.

A statement to Nub News said: "Our housing function has been identified by the council as an area requiring improvement.

"As we have prepared for an inspection by the Regulator of Social Housing, it has become clear that landlord services need an experienced housing expert to help shape the quality service residents deserve.

"We are very pleased that a senior housing professional has joined the team as an interim, to work with members and residents to drive forward this important work."

In the last external report on Thurrock housing in 2025, its service was heavily criticsed.

Mr D'Mello arrives with a CV showing senior posts in the housing sector and he says: "My career has taken me from frontline and operational housing roles into Director, Executive Director and Board-level leadership.

"I have led housing management, property and estate services, development, care and support, homelessness, mental health, older people's services and complex regulated operations.

"That breadth helps me see how each part of an organisation connects, and how decisions affect residents, colleagues, partners and performance.

"I have led strategy, transformation, service improvement and growth in complex organisations. My experience includes improving customer and housing services, strengthening governance and assurance, developing new models of care and support, overseeing commercial growth, leading major bids and partnerships, and working through mergers, acquisitions and organisational change."

Though Mr D'Mello's personal 'Linked-in' page (at the time of writing this report) shows his appointment to Thurrock Council., it also says he is still Executive Director of Business Development & Strategy (Housing) at the Churchill Group - a leading UK-based facilities management provider.

However, when asked, Thurrock Council confirmed Mr D'Mello's interim appointment today (Wednesday, 23 September), saying: "Mr D'Mello no longer works for Churchill Group, he works full-time in his role at Thurrock Council."

COMMENT:

Nub News editor Neil Speight says:"Should Mr D'Mello deliver improvement on all related services in Thurrock, there will be little doubt he is a worthwhile investment.

"I have met very few people who don't believe it is well-worth paying top dollar for the right people. The problem in Thurrock over the past couple of decades has been its inability to find the right people, instead creating a bloated 'gravy-train' of pretty hopeless senior managers whose salaries seem unjustifiable and their end of term report card consistently says' could do better'!

"With the huge churn of such officers it's been difficult to keep track of just how much public money has been flushed down the drain on these people.

"Reform were right to trumpet the need for change and promised to lift the lid on profligacy and instigate real scrutiny on the effectiveness of officers and their value for money.

"When I was notified about this appointment by concerned people in middle management at the council, who are often unfairly damned through association with poor bosses, I shared their concern that this is another unwarranted 'job for the boys' and it won't address the real issues caused by management bloat.

"It should also be noted that many of Mr D'Mello's skills overlap with those required in the job descriptions of many of those on the 28 strong list of management roles.

"I haven't heard of any of those 28 roles being ended so my fear, and that of others inside the council, is of more costly, inefficient duplicity and warring between directors. I've banged on enough about the Thurrock gravy train and I see little sign, with this, of it slowing down.

"It would have been good to get Reform's take on this and I wrote personally to cabinet members concerned directly with this appointment, including council leader Richard Bingley, six days ago. None have responded."