SOCIAL services chiefs are shelling out nearly double the wages bill of a small primary school on training staff.

The council department have earmarked around £506,000 this year to educate and update social workers and other employees.

But Cllr Frank Rushton last night questioned if staff need so much training to do their jobs properly.

And he suggested social services could be paying too much for in-house courses.

The Ladybridge Primary governor said his school planned to spend a total of about £280,000 on wages this year, far less than the social services training budget.

He added: "The comparison between the two concerns me. Are we training people all day and every day, doing super training nobody else does, or are we paying too much?"

But Social Services chairman Cllr Ken Peters defended the cost saying that last year 5000 people benefited from such courses.

He added: "Training does cost money and, if we want to maintain the quality of staff we have, it will continue to cost. We looked at the cost of training as part of the compulsory competitive tendering process and external training was often double that of our own department. We are now training people from the private sector who recognise the high quality specialist service we provide."

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