Just before David Cameron moved into Number Ten, he was asked what would happen if his ministers proposed cuts that involved frontline reductions. ‘They’ll be sent straight back to their departments to think again,’ he claimed.
On that basis, there should be a lot of rethinking going on in Whitehall. The level of cuts we are experiencing means that dismantling many frontline services is inevitable.
In local government, the GMB union is predicting 200,000 job losses this year in England alone. And it won’t just be the ‘back-office bureaucrats’ who are going – redundancy notices have also been sent to dinner ladies, social workers and child protection professionals.
Manchester City Council and Hampshire County Council are just two recent examples of authorities announcing culls of staff.
Meanwhile, stories abound across the country of planned library closures, postponed school refurbishments and cuts to youth clubs and day centres.
There will also be fewer bobbies on the beat. According to the Association of Police Authorities, we can expect a reduction of 11,000 officers and 14,000 support staff over the next four years.
As Philip Johnston points out in this month’s cover feature (see 'Force to reckon with'), there have long been arguments over the lack of a police presence on our streets. But it is hard to see how a cut in police numbers on this scale will not lead to a reduction of capacity on the front line.
Even in the protected NHS, primary care trusts are in meltdown as managers grapple with a financial crisis and understandable fears that they are about to lose their own jobs (see 'Accident waiting to happen'). Outpatient waiting times have been extended and restrictions tightened for procedures including cataract removals, hip and knee replacements and tonsillectomies.
No part of the public sector will be immune from the carnage to come. And every member of the public will be affected in some way.
We have already seen violent demonstrations over the increases to university tuition fees, while town hall protests are becoming more and more frequent as budgets are finalised.
Councils and other public bodies will have to face the wrath of residents, patients and parents as the full extent of the service cutbacks becomes apparent. But it is the politicians – not the public sector staff – who made promises they knew they could not keep.
Mike Thatcher is the editor of Public Finance
