THE cost of paying for union officials’ time off at Bolton Council has been revealed as one of the highest in the country.

In 2015/16, “facility time” — paid time off taken by union representatives to carry their duties — cost the local authority was more than £390,000, according to data obtained by the TaxPayers’ Alliance.

That figure was the highest reported in the North West and in the top 10 in England, although almost a third of councils analysed did not publish the data on their involvement with unions.

In January, Bolton Council outlined plans to reduce the cost of facility time, which union chiefs labelled a “vicious and vindictive attack”.

Bernadette Gallagher, branch secretary of Bolton Unison, has questioned the accuracy of the newly released figures.

She said: “There is a lot of information in these figures that we don’t necessarily believe is accurate.

“Different authorities record these figures in different way, and perhaps Bolton Council has been more open than others have.

“We are currently in negotiations with Bolton Council and this figure will come down in future as a result of those negotiations.

“We are hoping that we can reach an agreement with the council.”

Bolton Council’s figure of £390,481 represented 0.33 per cent of the authority’s wage bill.

The data also showed that 7.8 members of council staff spent at least 50 per cent of their time on trade union duties.

The council wants to change its arrangements with the Unison and GMB unions, so that it funds only two full-time officials.

Currently, the council funds one full-time representative for both unions as well as a full time assistant branch secretary and the equivalent of 3.1 other full time posts shared between four people.

The two local authorities which spent the most on facility time were Birmingham City Council with £1,124,924 and Leeds City Council with £502,095.

Alex Wild, the Research Director of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Trade unions are voluntary bodies of members and so should only receive the support of those members, not taxpayers.

“A huge amount continues to fund union duties, often without the express knowledge or consent of taxpayers, which simply isn’t right.”

A council spokesman said: “Over the last few years the council has allocated temporary additional resources to the Trade Unions to help with a number of council initiatives, including the Pay and Grading review, a large number of service reviews / restructures with regards to the budget options, and the recent set up and implementation of the Local Authority Trading Company, Bolton Cares.

"There has been a reduction in staffing levels across the council during this period at all levels, which now needs to be reflected in facility time.

"The council is proposing to reduce the number of corporately funded full-time officials and better utilise the departmental Trade Union stewards across the council.

"We are currently consulting with the unions on these changes and propose to implement them from April 2017.”