Deborah Cadman left the council in March 2024 after a tumultuous three years in which the council was declared ‘bankrupt’
Deborah Cadman/Birmingham City Council House(Image: Martin O’Callaghan/Birmingham Live)
The former chief executive of Birmingham City Council, Deborah Cadman, received just shy of £500,000 during the year she quit the beleaguered authority amid its chaotic bankruptcy, we can reveal today.
Belatedly-published council accounts for the year 2023-2024 revealed Ms Cadman was ‘compensated for loss of office’ to the tune of £130,194 as part of a departure package, on top of a salary of £269,750 and pension contributions of £68,961.
The accounts also showed she had received a £25,000 pay rise at the start of 2023, weeks before the council’s financial implosion.
READ MORE: Massive Labour shocks at Birmingham City Council as veteran councillors axed by party
At the time of her departure the council said she had not received a ‘golden handshake’ or settlement payment beyond her salary entitlements.
The council this week published its amended accounts for 2021-22 and overdue accounts for 2022-23 and 2023-24, alongside its accounts for the 12 months to April 2025.
They came with a strong caveat that they remained ‘draft’ as their accuracy could not be guaranteed because the council’s financial records were sullied by the catastrophic failures of the ‘Oracle’ system.
They were issued by Carol Culley, the new executive director of finance and the responsible S151 officer, a status with legal responsibility for the council’s finances.
Council chief executive Deborah Cadman
Cadman’s departure in March 2024 was described at the time as a resignation. At the time the council was under the oversight of government-appointed commissioners, led by Max Caller, who had responsibility for hiring and firing senior officers.
Since her departure Caller has described the council he walked into, with Cadman at the helm, as ‘failing in many areas’ and has reflected that senior leaders failed to respond with sufficient urgency to the massive challenges.
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Cadman’s appointment in March 2021 was hailed a historic breakthrough moment – she was the first person of colour to lead the country’s biggest unitary authority with a strong pedigree as a local government leader. Her Brummie roots immediately ingratiated her with a public fed-up of a stream of CEOs without local links.
Formerly chief executive at the West Midlands Combined Authority, her appointment was celebrated as a great move.
Under her leadership the council put on a dazzling Commonwealth Games in 2022, while the city’s Labour politicians hailed a ‘golden decade’ ahead for the city.
But behind the scenes we now know things were falling apart, with multiple major projects running into huge problems and the spectre of equal pay casting a long shadow, alongside a poor culture of governance and secrecy.
It was under Cadman’s watch that the council agreed to ‘go live’ in 2022 with the doomed Oracle IT system that has since been declared a catastrophe, and responsible for the failure to deliver credible annual accounts.
It was also on her watch that equal pay liabilities continued to build, especially in a badly-run waste service.
Prior to her departure she said she had been let down by senior colleagues with oversight of finances and operations, including the waste service, and had inherited a toxic environment.
In a Birmingham Live interview she had accepted ‘some responsibility’ for the dire mess the council was in but also pointed the finger at past senior members of the council team who had ‘not done the right thing’.
READ MORE: Council’s £244k a year chief speaks out on why she is not quitting despite failings and chaos
When she quit she claimed she was going by choice and had always intended to leave once the council was on the road to improvement and recovery, though this was at odds with her previous pledges to stay on.
In a statement she said: “It has been the honour of my life to be the chief executive of the city in which I was born and raised. I wish my colleagues every success in transforming the council into one that this great city deserves.”
According to Cadman’s LinkedIn she has since taken on several non-executive director roles with organisations the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Centre for Cities and the University of Birmingham, and is an advisor to business consultants Newtrality.
In her introduction to the 2023-24 accounts, finance chief Culley wrote that she was unable to ‘establish with a reasonable level of certainty’ that the financial records are ‘free from material misstatement’.
She wrote: “The council implemented a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) system in April 2022 – software which supports and integrates different parts of the council’s operations.
“There have been a number of issues with the running of the system since then.
“While fixes have been put in place to ensure the council’s assets are safeguarded, and to ensure transactions with residents, suppliers and customers can occur appropriately, it is not possible to establish with a reasonable level of certainty that the ledger is free from material misstatement for this financial year.”
She added: “It would be very costly for the council to gather the data needed to ensure the ledger is sufficiently free from material misstatement. It is unlikely that this work would represent value for money.”
She also highlighted a series of ‘suspected breaches of laws and regulations by the council’ that were subject to ongoing investigation or review. These include:
potentially ‘overstating’ costs moved between the Housing Revenue Account (a separate council entity) and the General Fundoverspending on the ‘Pollinations’ project in Victoria Squarebreaches linked to equal pay liabilitiesthe Regulator of Social Housing having to issue a regulatory notice because the council failed to complete all its required statutory inspections (as a landlord) leaving thousands of tenants at risk of harmthe council continuing to trade with its wholly owned subsidiary, Acivico, despite the contract having lapsed.
We have contacted the council and reached out to Ms Cadman to offer the opportunity to comment.