Buckinghamshire County Council has been accused of "hypocrisy" after it announced plans to recruit a further batch of social workers from Romania.

Wycombe Labour Group says Tory-led BCC faces a crisis of its own making after chief executive Chris Williams said 81 social worker positions in the troubled Children’s Services department needed to be filled, as of the beginning of June.

Children's Services in Bucks were rated "inadequate" by Ofsted in a damning report last year, and a further study published in March criticised high staff turnover and vacancy rates.

After drafting in nine social workers from Romania in March, BCC now plans head back and interview 12 more, citing a shortage of candidates in this country.

While Wycombe’s MP Steve Baker and other Conservatives calling for changes to free movement in the EU, Labour has criticised the county council for "spending millions" on the foreign recruitment drive.

And the party slammed BCC for its reliance on "costly" agency staff, which currently cost taxpayers £840,000 a year more than workers on regular contracts.

David Williams, Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Wycombe, said: "Steve Baker wants to stop the free movement of EU nationals and is campaigning for the UK to leave the EU.

Meanwhile up the road, his Tory colleagues are recruiting Romanians to get them out of a hole of the Tories’ own making. What hypocrisy.

"The Tories say the last Labour Government was profligate. We can now see its spending on social workers and social work was a prudent, long term investment.

"This Government cuts and cuts until there is a crisis – and then has to put things right at an enormous cost, both financial and social.

"The pigeons are starting to come home to roost for the Tories."

BCC cut this year's Children’s Services budget by nearly £1million - from £42.24m in 2013/14, to £41.3m in 2014/15.

The council says 56 of its 241 children’s social worker posts are currently covered by agency staff, with each costing £15,000 a year more than permanent staff.

Karen Dolton, BCC’s interim service director for children’s services, says BCC is working to reduce the reliance on agency staff, but insisted a certain number are needed for flexibility.

She said: "We’ve had a very successful recruitment drive for children’s social workers this year and we’ve appointed 33 high quality permanent staff, nine of whom are from Romania.

"Following the success of our recruitment trip to Romania in March we’re planning to interview 12 more candidates during the summer.

"All local authorities across Britain, and especially in the South East, struggle to recruit experienced social workers, because there’s a national shortage. Relying on agency workers is temporary, and far preferable to leaving posts unfilled.

"Once the 11 newly qualified staff and the nine recruits from Romania are in post – along with others we’re recruiting in the next couple of months – we will have reduced our reliance on agency workers significantly, possibly to just 30.

"It’s important to us to recruit and retain a highly skilled and committed stable workforce. It’s better for the children, it’s more cost-effective and more efficient in delivering services. And this is what we’ve been putting our efforts into."

The county council says it is also working with Bucks New University to develop a ‘Social Work Academy’ to train the next generation of staff for the county.