A shake-up in who employs the district's traffic wardens is going to add an extra £45,000 onto South Hams Council's wage bill as it will necessitate employing extra staff.

But the council expects to get that back – and more – with the extra £52,000 worth of parking tickets it expects to hand out.

South Hams Council used to operate 11 traffic wardens, these days called civil enforcement officers, who are responsible for enforcing yellow lines on the roads as well as parking in council-run car parks across the district.

It now has just four left, with one post vacant, after Devon County Council decided to take back responsibility for roadside parking as of April 1.

The South Hams Council executive has now decided to take on an extra two civil enforcement officers to fill the gaps left by the shake-up, at £22,447 per post.

But councillors were told that the expenditure will be covered by the expected income from parking fines, which is estimated at £26,000 per officer.

A report to the executive declared: 'While

the proposals represent an additional two

full-time-equivalent posts, the financial impact

is reduced because the income generated by

civil enforcement officers equates to approximately £26,000 per post against the total employee cost, including shift allowance on-costs, of £22,447.

'This cost-neutral position will be closely monitored and annually reviewed so, should civil enforcement officers cease to sustain a cost-neutral position, the resource can be reduced until a cost-neutral position has been re-established.'

South Hams Council has been responsible for policing parking on the roads along with its car parks since the police handed the job to the county council six years ago, with the county then handing it to the district.

Now Devon County Council has decided to take back the responsibility and create its own county-wide traffic warden service, with 45 officers transferring from the various district councils.

The county council is hoping that the move will save money on its own budget of approximately £400,000.

Cllr Stuart Hughes, the county council cabinet councillor for highways, said: 'It will probably be difficult to notice any difference in the service on the ground, but the civil enforcement officers working on behalf of the county council will only be covering on-street parking.

'These changes offer the greatest opportunity to reduce operational costs and to provide much better value for money for Devon residents.'

A spokesman for South Hams Council said: 'The back-office team and the civil enforcement officers have more than enough work to continue with.

'The loss of front-line and back-office staff is proportionate to the workload lost, although we have lost some economies of scale.

'The team also hopes to now be able to dedicate more time to working with the various towns and communities on projects that we have previously struggled to accommodate.'