Watford Borough Council has paid more than £150,000 to consultants for advice on how it can cut costs.

Figures shown to the council’s budget panel revealed it spent £91,000 commissioning AKA Consulting to “develop the council’s approach to value for money”.

A second consultancy firm, Public Sector Consulting, was paid £68,000 to help Watford look at where it could cut costs in its departments.

The council defended its spending on consultants saying the two firms had helped them save more money than the cost of their fees.

Finance officers said AKA had helped the borough council find more than £100,000 of savings over four years and Public Sector Consulting had enabled Watford to identify £3m of efficiency savings.

At a meeting of the council’s budget panel yesterday opposition councillors questioned the more than £300,000 overall consultancy bill Watford had racked up in a 15-month period.

Asif Khan, a Labour councillor for the Leggatts ward, said he feared such a large spend on outside consultants could cause resentment among council staff and bewilderment with the public.

Responding to his comments Councillor Andy Wylie, the Liberal Democrat executive member for finance, said the council only hired consultants in when it needed specialist work beyond the expertise of its permanent staff.

“It is very important to understand we don’t have within our staff enough skills to carry out very complex items of work,” he said.

“Our staff do very well but in some cases they are a jack of all trades but a master on none.”

Councillor Wylie added he thought it was correct the panel scrutinised the council’s spending on consultants to ensure it did not get “consultant-itis” and become too reliant on outside experts.

In the report to the committee the council was shown to have spent a total of £334,124 on consultants between April last year and this July.

Among some of the other firms hired was Tom Fleming Consultancy, which was paid £45,000 to advise on the “future use of cultural activities to help achieve a more balanced town centre”.

The council also spent more than £27,000 on climate change consultants and £18,000 consultants to compile a Housing Value for Money report.