An under-fire social services department spent nearly £1.5million on agency staff in just six months, The Argus can reveal.

West Sussex Social Services was one of just eight local authorities, out of 150, deemed inadequate for its children's services by Ofsted.

Now a Freedom of Information (FOI) request has revealed how in March there were 45 full-time social worker vacancies in the department - with £763,000 of the £1.5million spent on covering just 20 posts.

This is equal to £5,500 per agency social worker per month – it should cost about £2,000 for each social worker.

The figures were made public after a Freedom of Information request by Ian Ross, Labour Parliamentary Candidate for Worthing West.

Mr Ross, who said he wanted to see how successful the council’s recruitment drive had been, branded the findings “shocking”.

The FOI revealed that despite a £500,000 recruitment drive in November last year to try and fill some of its vacant spaces, at the end of last month there were 84 full-time social worker posts vacant in West Sussex, 45 of which were in Children’s Services.

Mr Ross wrote to Henry Smith, the council's leader, to make him aware of the findings.

In that letter, he wrote: “Taking the politics out of the situation, I was lost for words when I found out the above information, especially when you put in the forefront of your mind that social services exist to protect vulnerable children and adults.

He said he was concerned that social services are spilt between the portfolios of councillors Pat Arculus and John De Mierre.

He said: “Surely the department would be more effective if social services became the responsibility of just one cabinet member who held overall responsibility.”

A spokesman for the council said Coun Smith would be writing to Mr Ross when he was back in the country and said a shortage of social workers was not unique to West Sussex He added that since the campaign, 26 social workers had been appointed, 11 of them to work in children’s services and that a further 22.5 full-time equivalents would be joining in the next few months.

The spokesman said: “We do use agency staff simply to ensure that vulnerable children are protected while we work to fill the posts we have vacant. It shows we put child safety before money.”

He added that splitting the portfolio between two cabinet members was a Government requirement.