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A NORTH East council which has to make £45m in savings spent more than £530,000 in one month on consultants.

Northumberland County Council, which is considering making hundreds of workers redundant, also forked out over £635,000 in the same period on agency staff.

The figures for December have come to light after Northumberland and all other local authorities were ordered by the Department for Communities and Local Government to publish details of all expenditure above £500.

The county council, which sets its budget for 2011/12 later this month, has published the expenses on its website.

Last night, one county councillor branded some of the costs “sickening,” while the authority hit back by insisting some of his criticism was “misleading.”

The figures show the council spent over £530,000 during December on “professional/consultancy/hired services.” This included more than £64,000 to consultant Gatenby Sanderson, the company which the council paid for the services of Keith Ireland.

Mr Ireland worked for the authority for 11 months covering various posts including deputy chief executive, and acting as a strategic adviser.

For just under six months of his stay, the council was forking out £1,175-a-day.

The council meanwhile also spent over £635,000 on agency staff, most of which were employed through its highways department.

It further forked out £55,818.65 on advertising and publicity, more than £100,000 on leased cars, £16,345.07 on mobile phone bills, £35,801.84 on printing and stationary, £100,374.76 on staff training, and £56,653.62 on “fees and expenses – other external providers.”

The council also spent £37,000 on external legal advice and £10,653.62 on external IT advice and support, despite having its own legal and IT departments.

Coun Steven Bridgett, who represents Rothbury and Coquetdale, last night described the expense as “sickening.”

He said: “The whole system is rotten, this is endemic in every council across the country – not just Northumberland.

“This council has to make some serious decisions over the next two weeks, with regard to the services we provide to the public and what I am being told by Joe Public is if they had to choose between having their bins collected, getting their roads fixed and having clean streets or spending over half a million-a-month on consultancy the answer is obvious.”

A council spokesperson said: “We’re completely open about all of these costs, with all spending over £500 available to view on our website.

“The criticism is misleading because the ‘professional, consultancy and hired services’ budget covers a huge range of services that the council has to buy in from outside – everything from payments to other agencies to court fees and legal support around childcare proceedings, payments to sub-contractors and matters relating to schools and highways.

“In the case of Gatenby Sanderson, the company has provided a number of interim staff to ensure the council can operate effectively during a period of massive change and a review of senior management that has helped deliver £1.9m of financial savings every year – over five years the investment saving up to £10m.”

:: Click here for a breakdown of all the council's spending