Kate Groucutt
Through our work with parents over 25 years, at Daycare Trust we know that access to affordable, flexible, accessible childcare is essential for working parents. The expansion of childcare places and increased financial support for childcare over the last 15 years has made a huge difference to millions of families, in particular to women. But these places will go unused if mothers and fathers don’t know about them.
Frances O'Grady
Today the Commons is debating the Government’s plans to increase the cap on NHS hospitals ability to raise private income to 49%. It currently varies from hospital to hospital but is, on average, 1.1% so this represents a massive increase.
Now some commentators have said that this is better than the original proposal to remove the cap entirely and that, in any case, almost no hospitals will get anywhere near that as there is not a market for a wholesale increase in private health provision in the current economic climate.
That misses the point however. The government is not trying to meet a market demand, it is trying to create one.
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.
Paul Nowak
Last week Alice blogged about the impact of the announcements in the autumn statement on public sector workers.
Of course most of the headlines were grabbed by the Chancellor’s announcement that he would impose two years of 1% pay-caps on public sector workers at the end of the current two year pay freeze (three years if you work in local government). At a stroke this announcement managed to undermine the ongoing negotiations around public sector pensions (which in part are about significant contribution increases in the context of a pay freeze); confirm the government’s intention to cut the living standards of public sector workers by 16.5%; and signal his seeming contempt for collective bargaining and fair negotiations. Having days earlier called on public sector unions to ‘get back around the negotiating table’ over pensions, the Chancellor effectively pulled the table away from them when it came to public sector pay.
Of course whether or not the government can hold to its 1% cap remains to be see. Previous governments of different political persuasions have struggled to maintain medium-term pay/incomes polices, particularly against the backdrop of turbulent economic conditions. Both Edward Heath and Jim Callaghan can testify to that.
But perhaps just as important as the announcement of the 1% cap, was the Chancellor’s call for Public Sector Pay Review Bodies to look at how public sector pay can be made ‘more responsive to local labour markets’.
Iain Murray
As with much of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement, the vast majority of the announcements on education, childcare and skills had already been trailed over the past week. The most controversial is the announcement that an extra £600M will be made available to establish 100 additional free schools in England over the coming three years, including a new type of specialist maths school for 16-18 year-olds. Another £600M will go to local authorities to help them create 40,000 additional school places to meet increased demand resulting from demographic change.
While the additional funding for schools is welcome, the inequitable distribution of resources is one further reminder of the favourable treatment that free schools receive at the hands of government in comparison to local authority schools.
Alice Hood
The Autumn Statement paints a pretty bleak picture of the next few years for public sector workers, characterised by ongoing cuts and squeezed living standards.
After a two year pay freeze (and even longer in local government), the Chancellor announced today that pay increases in the public sector will be capped at an average 1% for the following two years. This comes at the same time as the proposed average 3.2% increase in pension contributions (phased in over 3 years), and inflation rates predicted to be around 3%. The TUC has calculated that this leaves public sector workers facing an average cut in their living standards of 16.5% by 2014-15.
Owen Tudor
Yesterday the global teacher union federation, Education International, exposed the massive revenues lost to governments through corporate tax avoidance and the impact of this on education and other vital public services which are at risk from government expenditure cuts. A new report, launched at Congress House, shows how powerful multinational companies use their global reach to avoid meeting their fair fiscal obligations, through strategies like exploiting legal loopholes and offshore tax havens. Global Corporate Taxation and Resources for Quality Public Services highlights the extraordinary statistic that an estimated 60% of all global trade is actually routed through tax havens.
The study was released this week to suport EI’s UK affiliates (ATL, EIS, NASUWT, NUT and UCU) who are striking against Government plans to slash teacher and other public sector pensions, with some teachers losing more than £50,000 over 20 years from the value of their pension. It argues that if the UK government took firm action on tax evasion, the money released would be more than what is going to be cut from public sector pensions.
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?
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.
Alice Hood
Two stories published in the last few days should convince any remaining doubters that the Government’s promises to protect the NHS are in tatters. Cuts, growing waiting lists and the massive top-down reorganisation of the NHS are all taking their toll.
Research published by the Royal College of Nursing today finds that more than 56,000 NHS posts are set to be cut. Half of these are clinical posts and one third of them are nursing roles. Particularly worrying is the finding that the pace of cuts is increasing. There are also a number of associated trends of cutting hours and replacing experienced staff with cheaper workers at lower grades.
