BOLTON Council has defended employing a political advisor for the ruling Labour group on £25,000-a-year.

Ed Jankowski is advisor to council leader, Cllr Cliff Morris. His roles include research, manning the party’s social media accounts, and acting as a Labour party press spokesman.

The political assistant job is a fixed-term post for six months. It has a pro-rata salary of £25,440 per year.

Mr Jankowski, who is in his early 20s, was previously employed in another role at the council.

Under law, both the Labour and Tory groups are entitled to have a political assistant funded by the local authority to help “discharge their functions as councillors”.

But the Tories say they rejected the offer because it was “an inappropriate use of public money”.

Tory leader, Cllr David Greenhalgh, said: “We discovered a few months ago that the council was employing a researcher and political advisor for the leader of the council and the Labour group. When I questioned the validity of this, I was shown that it was an entitlement. It was then and only then that we were offered a political assistant for the Conservative group, an offer I declined as I do not believe at a time when savings are being made in so many areas, it is an appropriate use of public money.”

The other two parties represented on the council — UKIP and the Liberal Democrats — do not qualify as their councillors do not constitute 10 per cent of the council’s overall make-up.

A spokesman for Bolton Council said that political assistants “have been around since the 1980s”.

They added: “Many local authorities have these. Bolton Council has had political assistants in the past and we are considering reintroducing these for the appropriate parties.

“We currently have one temporary political assistant for the Labour group.

“The Conservative group was offered the same, but did not want one at the time.

“The Liberal Democrats and UKIP groups would not have enough members to be offered an assistant.”

The council said it was against its policy for an individual staff member to make a comment.

UKIP group leader, Cllr Sean Hornby, said it was “a lot of money to be spending”.

He added: “All credit to the Tories for refusing to have an assistant of their own.

“We cannot justify this kind of spending at a time when the council is making cuts and people are losing their jobs.”

Lib Dem campaigner Kevin Walsh added: “This is a prime example of the Bolton Labour Party wasting taxpayer funds for their own purposes. Not content on wasting over £50,000 a year on the Bolton Scene, the Labour-led council is forking out further funds to help run its social media and press responses.

“This is cash that we in the Liberal Democrats asked to be shifted towards preventing cuts to services for vulnerable young people, but the Labour group rejected.”