A ROW has erupted within the Labour Party after it emerged a Labour-run council is aiming to relaunch its flagship theatre with dozens of staff on "exploitative" zero hours contracts.

Darlington Borough Council said it aimed to use zero hours contracts to fill the majority of posts at the former Darlington Civic Theatre - which will reopen this winter as the Hippodrome following an £11.7m refurbishment - despite party leader Jeremy Corbyn vowing to outlaw such contracts.

Darlington Labour MP Jenny Chapman said the council's ambition to use the contracts, where the employer is not obliged to provide any minimum working hours, while the worker is not obliged to accept any work offered, was intolerable.

She said: “It is well known that these contracts are exploitative and used to disadvantage workers and that is not acceptable. They should be kept at the absolute minimum.”

Tories have been quick to leap upon the schism. Councillor Heather Scott, Conservative leader for Darlington, said: “I am not against zero hours contracts as they can be quite good for some, but I am surprised that a Labour-controlled council would do this, considering it is totally against party policy – it seems hypocritical.”

In Labour’s general election manifesto, the party pledged to ban zero hours contracts as part of a plan for security and equality at work, “so that every worker gets a guaranteed number of hours each week” amid rising concerns for workers.

The use of zero hours workers has rocketed in the North-East in recent years, with the TUC earlier this year naming the region as the UK capital of insecure work, with the equivalent of two-thirds of jobs created in the North-East in the last five years being without guaranteed pay or normal employment rights.

At the time, TUC Regional Secretary Beth Farhat said: “People need jobs they can live on. But if you don’t how much work you will have from one day to the next, making ends meet can be nightmare. Too many bosses in our region are getting away with shady employment practices."

In July, a spokesman for leader Jeremy Corbyn reiterated Labour’s stance on the issue and said the party remained committed to ending such contracts.

Ms Chapman, who employs Councillor Nick Wallis - the authority’s cabinet member for leisure - in her constituency office, said: “I understand that it is not unusual in the leisure industry, but we ought to be aspiring to be better than that.

“For a flagship enterprise like the Hippodrome, we ought to be doing the best we can for all its staff.

“I would have thought that a theatre can plan relatively straightforwardly, knowing when performances are going to take place.

“It should not be the normal to have staff on zero-hour contracts in the long-term.

The authority, which owns and operates the theatre, also uses zero hours contracts to employ some workers at the Dolphin Centre and across service areas including school meals, cleaning, parks, refuse and recycling and residential care.

The Hippodrome’s website is advertising 56 vacancies with 35 of them offering casual work on a zero hours contract, ten zero hour and 11 permanent contracts for stagehands as well as 25 zero-hour and nine permanent contracts for front of house assistants, with one vacancy for a technician also published online.

A spokeswoman for the Hippodrome said the theatre’s zero hours contracts would offer workers flexibility and would come with contractual benefits, such as sick pay and holiday entitlement.

She added: “This is an exciting time to become part of the Darlington Hippodrome team.

“We are seeking talented and enthusiastic people for both front of house and technical posts. Some of the positions will be employed on a casual (zero hours) basis.

"There needs to be a degree of flexibility as staffing requirements change significantly from one show to the next.”

The use of zero hours contracts is common and welcomed within the theatre industry, according to a number of workers, some of whom previously worked for the Civic.

Peter Tate, the theatre’s former house manager, said the Hippodrome would offer more permanent contracts than was previously the case.

He said the theatre had historically operated using “casual employment”, which worked well for many in the industry.

Mr Tate said: “The theatre works in such a way that sometimes, you cannot do anything else.

“Staffing levels will depend on how many tickets are sold or the kind of show that is on – there’s also shutdowns to consider.

“These contracts have been there throughout the life of the theatre and historically, theatres have always worked in the same way.

“They have to be staffed according to audience numbers, it would not make sound financial sense to do anything else.”

Another former Civic worker, Joanne Vipond, added: “A casual contract was great, I was at university and it enabled me to work shows one week, but not the next - it could fit in with my life.”

Staff who previously worked at the Civic were made redundant before the refurbishment and have been invited to reapply for their roles.