WILTSHIRE Council have accepted 228 applications for voluntary redundancy from their staff.

In total, during the first phase of £4m cost cutting process, the council received 327 submissions from people offering to leave with 99 being rejected.

They are now considering a further 29 applications from employees while the final phase of the redundancy process will close next Friday.

Maggie Rae, Wiltshire Council corporate director, said: “The number is well in line with what we predicted and it has been a smooth process.”

A restructure of the council’s management is also being proposed, to begin in October, which could see their 18 service directors offered voluntary redundancy too.

John Thomson, deputy leader of Wiltshire Council, said: “The service director position has never been touched since we moved from five councils to one and we feel this could be the time.”

Over the next four years, the council intend to make around £120m worth of cuts to their budget and at Tuesday’s cabinet meeting, taking place at Monkton Park, in Chippenham, councillors will hear a report on a draft business plan for 2013 to 2017.

While, councillors will also be asked to vote to enter into a cost cutting partnership with Wiltshire Police which would potentially see 200 of their admin staff moving to the council, to share expertise, and the police having a presence in Wiltshire Council’s 20 campus buildings.

If this is accepted, the two organisations would then carry out further reviews of their services.

Angus Macpherson, police and crime commissioner for Wiltshire, said: “We think that there is a lot of crossover and this is an opportunity to work together and provide services together. We are trying to protect frontline services and I’m not foreseeing job losses.”