Huge job cuts’ for public sector

The CIPD (The Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development) says public sector cuts will impact on service provision.

As many as 350,000 public sector blue collar jobs could be lost over the next five years; education and health care being the exceptions but notwithstanding the robustness a transfer to flexible workforces is inevitable

Chief economist John Philpott says the recession will bring “a bloodbath in the public finances” which will force employers to slash their workforce. This could lead to “guerrilla war” in the workplace, characterised by repeated strike action, he said. The public sector union, Unison, said support for Labour had “collapsed”. Speaking ahead of the union’s national conference, general secretary Dave Prentis said a poll of 1,000 members found just over 30% planned to back Labour at the next election, down from 42% a year ago. “Public sector workers were always regarded as the heartlands of Labour, but that vote has collapsed,” he said.

‘Fiscal squeeze’
Figures released last week by the Office for National Statistics showed that overall UK unemployment was rising faster in this recession than at any time since the 1980s. Despite this, employment in public sector occupations such as education, health, and public administration were up 2% year-on-year. But Mr Philpott believes any optimism based on figures like this is “premature”. ”The public sector has yet to feel the full impact of the recession, and the resultant bloodbath in the public finances,” he said. Sympathy will have been frayed by private sector job losses and pay freezes which will have touched many families. The CIPD’s current estimate is that the fiscal squeeze implied by government plans will result in a total of 350,000 job cuts in the public sector overall between 2010/11 and 2014/15. ”This will be preceded by around 30,000 job cuts in local authorities in the next year.”