16 January 2009
By Alex Klaushofer
Councils are set to make swingeing job cuts in an attempt to balance the books ahead of their budgets next month.
One in seven local authorities has decided to cut jobs as a result of the economic downturn, according to a Local Government Association survey of council bosses in England published this week.
Nottingham City Council plans to make savings of £12m by losing the equivalent of 350 full-time posts, affecting 400 members of staff. Making the cuts was the only way the authority could draw up a workable budget, the council said.
'This year is exceptional. The combination of the global recession, which has caused some of our costs to rise and our income to fall, means it will not be possible to set a balanced budget for 2009/10 without reducing the number of staff employed by the council,' it said in a statement.
Last month, Oldham Council's Cabinet approved cuts of 488 posts in 2009/10 and a further 56 in 2010/11, making estimated savings of £8.9m. If they receive final approval when the council's budget is set next month, they will reduce layers of management from as many as ten in some departments to a maximum of five.
But other councils said that plans to reduce their salary bills had been in the pipeline for some time, and were not recession-related. Bristol City Council decided last June to shed up to 450 posts as part of a modernisation programme.
'This is something that we've had on the cards for a long time,' said a spokesman. 'It's part of a major overhaul to improve performance and services.'
Cardiff City Council said it had been considering reducing its workforce by 750 posts as part of an operational review conducted over the past 18 months. 'It will take place over a five- to eight-year period,' said a spokeswoman. 'That's not related to the current downturn.'
At a jobs summit organised by the prime minister earlier this week, Unison general secretary Dave Prentis rejected the idea that job cuts were the solution to the downturn. 'Public services are needed more than ever… in a recession, they are the first line of defence,' he said.
PFjan2009
