Anisa Darr, Barnet's finance director and Section 151 officer since 2017, leaves in December. Two new assistant director posts follow, one at about £150,000.
Barnet Council’s most senior finance officer has resigned. The council plans to appoint an interim to cover the job while it recruits a permanent replacement.
Updated 29 October: Full Council approved the salary packages for the three posts on 20 October, by 58 votes to 1, according to the meeting webcast. It also delegated the designation of an interim Section 151 officer to the chief executive, in consultation with the opposition leader and the chair of the Employment Sub-Committee. No interim has been named yet. Our report on the meeting.
Updated 8 October: the council has now named the departing finance chief as Anisa Darr, who will leave in December. Details below.
Updated 10 October: the Employment Sub-Committee agreed on 5 October to create the two assistant director posts and to recruit a new finance chief, according to the report now before Full Council for 20 October. Both assistant director posts are Grade 6, £107,477 to £130,937. The upgraded director post is Grade 5, £129,800 to £142,071. Council is asked to approve those packages and to let the chief executive designate an interim Section 151 officer, in consultation with the Leader, the Leader of the Opposition and the sub-committee chair. The report warns there “may in practice need to be more than one holder” of the interim designation.
The post is the Executive Director of Finance, who is also the council’s Section 151 officer. That is the statutory role responsible for the council’s finances. The resignation comes days after the council published its plan to close a £200 million budget gap.
The resignation is recorded in a report to the council’s Employment Sub-Committee, which met on Monday 5 October. The report does not name the post-holder or say when they leave. It was added to the agenda as urgent business at the chief executive’s request, “to allow the recruitment process to commence”.
The same meeting was asked to approve two new assistant director posts and the upgrade of a third role. The papers are on the meeting page. The decisions had not been published when we checked on 6 October.
Who is leaving
Barnet Council announced on 6 October that Anisa Darr, Executive Director of Finance and Section 151 officer, will leave in December. The council says:
- she joined Barnet as a finance graduate in 2007 and, apart from a year elsewhere, has spent her career there
- she was appointed Executive Director of Finance and Section 151 officer in 2017
- she played a part in the development of Brent Cross Town and in securing funding for Brent Cross West station
- she was central to developing the council’s new financial sustainability plan
- she was President of the Society of London Treasurers from April 2025
Chief executive Cath Shaw said Ms Darr had “signalled earlier on this year” that she wanted to leave, and had extended her stay to finish the financial sustainability plan. The council says arrangements for her replacement will be announced in due course.
The finance chief’s job
The council’s role profile, attached to the report, sets out what the Executive Director of Finance is responsible for:
- about 70 staff, plus management of an outside contractor
- £618 million of direct budget responsibility, most of it housing benefit (about £282 million), council tax income (about £220 million) and business rates income (about £111 million)
- indirect oversight of the council’s gross spending of £982 million
The report says filling the job permanently is likely to take “several months”. In the meantime the chief executive would appoint a “suitably qualified and experienced” interim. Only Full Council can formally designate who holds the Section 151 role.
The chief executive is also given authority to change the job title and description before recruitment starts.
The new and upgraded posts
| Post | What it is for | Cost in the papers |
|---|---|---|
| Assistant Director of Finance (new) | Oversee procurement and internal audit, and manage the Head of Exchequer | About £150,000 a year including on-costs; salary band £100,818 to £122,824 |
| Assistant Director, Financial Sustainability Programme Delivery (new) | Lead a new team of four or five driving the savings plan to 2029 | Grade 6; no annual figure given |
| Director of Resident Experience, Digital, Data and Technology (upgraded) | Existing assistant director role, now also running the IT service taken back from Capita | £15,000 a year more at the top of the grade, including on-costs |
Both new assistant director posts would be paid for from the council’s contingency budget. The upgrade would come from existing budgets.
Why the council says it needs them
The Assistant Director of Finance answers the CIPFA external assurance review, commissioned by the government earlier this year. The report says CIPFA made recommendations on procurement and internal audit. It also found “weaknesses in first line control ownership, financial planning and governance discipline”. We covered that review in our report on CIPFA’s findings. The council says it lacks senior management capacity to put the recommendations into practice.
The financial sustainability team would be an assistant director, a head of service and two or three more staff. The report says doing the work with existing staff or outside consultants would be “less cost-effective”. It would also risk the programme “not delivering sufficient results in the timescales required”.
The director upgrade follows the decision to bring IT back in-house when Capita’s contract ended. The post-holder now manages the IT service directly. The council says the post is not becoming a chief officer, and the holder does not have to reapply.
What happens next
- Full Council, 20 October, 7pm: councillors are asked to approve the salary packages for the new and upgraded posts (Grade 6, £107,477 to £130,937, for the two assistant directors; Grade 5, £129,800 to £142,071, for the director) and to delegate the interim Section 151 designation to the chief executive. The permanent Section 151 officer will still be designated by Full Council.
- Recruitment: for the permanent finance chief, candidates will be interviewed by the Employment Sub-Committee after a search.
- Cabinet, 12 October: the council’s medium-term financial strategy and the financial sustainability plan go to Cabinet, as set out on the Cabinet agenda.
What it means for you
The Section 151 officer is the person who signs off that the council’s budget is robust. They would also be the one to issue a Section 114 notice if the council could not balance its books. A change in that role, while the council is in talks with the government about a council tax rise above the usual cap, matters to every household in the borough.
Barnet’s council tax bands and this year’s charges are in our council tax guide. The council’s budget survey is open to residents now.
We will report the sub-committee’s decisions and the Full Council vote.
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