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Matt Dykes

Matt Dykes

I’m a Policy Officer at the TUC, covering issues around transport, public service reform and civil society. I’m responsible for the TUC’s work on public service reform and have led the work on the TUC’s response to the Open Public Services white paper, as well as authoring the TUC’s report Civil Society and Public Services: Collaboration not Competition. I’m particularly interested in the relationship between public services and civil society, social enterprises, mutuals and co-operatives.

I’ve been at the TUC for 8 years and was formerly policy officer for our London region and national youth officer. I have previously worked for the Mayor of London as well as several years in the civil service. I’ve been an active rep for both PCS and UNISON, and was also a founder member of Justice for Colombia.

  • Public services

    Pay cuts, job losses, outsourcing: local government in 2012

    8th December 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    A recent survey  of local authority directors and chief executives painted a bleak picture looking ahead at the next 12 months, as the second year of front loaded cuts to local government bites even deeper.

    We saw in the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement that the combination of attacks on pay and pensions is imposing massive cuts on the average living standards of public sector workers.

    Little wonder then that yesterday’s joint report from the Audit Commission and Local Government Association on the future of workforce pay and employment in local government gives us real cause for concern.

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  • Economics

    Good tidings for rail?

    29th November 2011 — Filed under: Economics

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    Did rail do well out of the Autumn Statement?  There are serious questions to ask still.  The government’s beaten a welcome retreat on rail fares … for now.  But what was there for rail manufacturing looking for respite after the government’s shambles over Thameslink.

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  • Public services

    How much more can the voluntary sector take?

    24th November 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    The politics of positioning is always a tricky game.  And so it is proving for many within the voluntary sector.  As austerity bites and the sector finds itself competing for scarce resources, it is understandable that many charity and voluntary sector leaders find themselves boxing clever with a government that has explicitly courted them with Big Society talk, public service commissioning opportunities and some useful budget tinkering on Gift Aid.

    However, it remains to be seen how tenable these positions remain in the face of a deepening crisis across the sector.  It seems that every week brings worsening prospects for jobs, funding and services. 

    While this clearly makes a mockery of the government’s Big Society aspirations, it might be argued that voices of opposition in the sector have been muted.  But is this soon to change?

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  • Public services

    The view from local government

    23rd November 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    Local government has borne the brunt of the government spending cuts this year and the prospect looks even bleaker next year as the front loaded cuts continue to bite, in many cases even deeper.

    So the Local Government Chronicle quarterly survey of local authority directors and chief executives is a particularly useful snapshot of how public service providers are coping with government-imposed austerity.

    The latest survey (see LGC 10/11/11)  has some telling results, with three key themes particularly apparent.

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  • Public services

    What destination for the government’s rail policy?

    25th October 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    Justine Greening’s promotion to Secretary of State for Transport has come at a crucial time.  The government has some very big choices to make on the future of rail in the UK.

    The government will be producing a white paper on the future of UK rail in the next month or so.  With three quarters of franchises up for renewal in the next five years, the opportunity remains to make a significant change to rail policy.

    Will the government put the interests of rail passengers and tax payers first and put an end to our dysfunctional and costly privatised rail industry?  Or will it take the option presented by the McNulty report and slash jobs, break up the rail network further and hand more power to private train operating companies, rewarding their executives and shareholders alike?

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  • Public services

    Public service mutuals: “A meaningful say”

    17th October 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    The gap between the reality and rhetoric  around the Government’s programme of public service reform continues to widen.

    The Open Public Services white paper was big on rhetoric. But does it bear up to scrutiny?

    Let’s take one example, public service mutuals. 

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  • Public services

    The health service market in action (guess the winner)

    20th September 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    When NHS Surrey came to award preferred bidder status for the delivery of its community health care services, which of the following organisations won the contract? Was it:

    • Local NHS Foundation Trust, Surrey and Borders Partnership
    • Much lauded NHS social enterprise spin out and ‘Big Society Award’ winner, Central Surrey Health
    • Private provider, Assura Medical Ltd, 75% owned by the Virgin Group?

    Those of you familiar with the Government’s private sector bonanza that was the Work Programme will probably have worked it out.  The award of NHS Surrey’s community health services to Assura Medical Ltd has caused a fair degree of outrage.  Clearer evidence of the privatisation by stealth of the NHS would be hard to come by.

    And, of course, this is also another wake up call for those who retain faith in the Big Society and the Government’s stated intention to open up public services to social enterprises, charities and employee-led mutuals.

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  • Public services

    Public Services Open for Business

    11th July 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    So we finally have it.  After months of delays, the Government today launched its ‘Open Public Services’ white paper. There’s little new here.  Most of its recommendations are gleaned from initiatives already announced in regard to health, education, mutuals and localism.

    What the white paper does do, however, is re-affirm the Coalition Government’s commitment to the marketisation of all public services outside of national security and the judiciary.  We are back in the territory the Prime Minister occupied in the heady days before the Health and Social Care Bill unravelled.

    David Cameron was adamant:

    This white paper says loud and clear that it shouldn’t matter if providers are from the state, private, or voluntary sector

    A clearer message to the market could not be given.  Public services are open for business.

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  • Public services

    Promoting an alternative vision of public service reform

    21st June 2011 — Filed under: Public services

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    This week UNISON published ‘Mutual Benefit’ an excellent new report looking at the issues of mutuals, co-operatives and social enterprises running public services. The report rightly raises many of the concerns that the TUC shares about the threats posed by this government’s market-led agenda.

    But it also points to an alternative approach to public service reform, raising arguments that have been conspicuous by their absence in the current policy debate.  We believe there’s real value in exploring these arguments further.

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  • Economics

    The end of the line for UK rail production?

    16th June 2011 — Filed under: Economics

    Matt Dykes Matt Dykes

    “We want the words ‘Made in Britain,’ ‘Created in Britain,’ ‘Designed in Britain,’ ‘Invented in Britain,’ to drive our nation forward. A Britain carried aloft by the march of the makers. That is how we will create jobs and support families” – George Osborne, Budget Statement, March 2011

    Bombardier Transportation, part of the French-Canadian global manufacturing group, is the last remaining train manufacturer in the UK and the heart of a rail engineering and production supply chain which constitutes one of the largest manufacturing clusters in Europe.  It employs 2,600 workers at its main plant in Derby, and more in its production centres in Crewe and Plymouth.  It builds trains for London Underground, UK rail and overseas markets.  It has formed groundbreaking learning agreements with its unions.

    You would think that this is exactly the sort of company that will spearhead the government’s drive to rebalance the economy towards production industries and export-led growth. Well, think again.

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