Council Jobs to Go -10% Staff Saving Needed

treliac

Poppy9 wrote: »

Jobs are cut on the QT in my LA. Someone leaves and they delay replacing them until in the end it's just accepted that the job is lost or they realise that the post has to be filled. It's become so tight in our office that when they tried to cut another vacant post no one had spare capacity at all to pick up any of the work so it didn't get done. Staff already taking work home with them or coming in weekends (for no pay) so the limit had been reached.

Regarding pensions. I can only speak for the Local Govt. Pension scheme but the average pension received by public sector workers is £3,800 a year. Women, who are 3/4 quarters of the scheme members - get just £1,600.
3-4% of council tax goes on the LGPS, but if it didn't fund members pensions, we would have to pay higher taxes for benefits and state pensions for members. The recent cuts to the LGPS cost the Government £2 billion in higher state benefits and state pensions.

Another gripe of public sector - sickness.

Figures are weighted by the fact that a lot of the public sector jobs involve risks. Police officers, nurses, firemen/women, refuse collectors, residental home staff etc. get injured on duty. For office bound staff the sickness rate average is about 2 days per annum (again though this can be distorted by 1 person in the office on long term sick). A work colleague thinks she has the record in our LA for not going sick once in 35 years. Personally I've had 2 days in the last 12 months but OH beats me as he's had 0 in 2 years.

OH Police officer. On the plus side he does get paid OT - various rates from NT, T+1/3,, T+1/2 or DT depending on reason, notice given etc.

On the minus side he can be forced to stay on duty after doing a 12 hour shift. His shift pattern can be changed at short notice. He can have his rest days cancelled at short (or long notice) - rest days are like people's weekends, except he doesn't work mon-fri. He also doesn't get a lunch hour or break time. He has to eat when he can and leave his food if he gets a call. It's the norm for him not to eat or drink anything all shift depending on which station he's working at and he hands over 11% of his pay for his pension.

Many LA staff based in schools are already on part year contract i.e. school clerks, cooks, cleaners who only get paid for 40 weeks per year.

Finally: Why is it that when LA contract services out to the private sector that the service is usually worse, complaints rise and the savings that were supposed to have been achieved by outsourcing never materialise?

Thank you. Another considered and fact-based contribution; in contrast to the popular prejudiced, uninformed, rhetoric.

Poppy9

Nobody is denying it's very hard in the private sector at the moment. OH worked private sector (was made redundant in 1987) and then had his own business for over 10 years. I was served by a woman in MFI last week who was to be made redundant after 22 years. I so felt for this woman as she felt at 62 she had no option but to retire. I couldn't resist telling her to look on council website as we had shortages of staff in many part-time roles like lollipop/dinner/cleaners etc. as no one seemed to want these jobs.

Things are not as rosy in the public sector as people on the outside looking in think.

If it was so wonderful we wouldn't have such huge recruitment problems, just look at many council websites where there is an open ad for child social workers (even before the Baby P case).

Unlike the private sector the public sector offers Equal Op employment so if you apply and have the right experience, qualifications, potential etc. then you stand as much chance of getting the job as anyone else. It's not a case of who you know as interviews in my local authority are standard interviews with all candidates asked the same 5 or 6 questions with no small talk and maybe a skills related test. You are scored on this interview and test and the highest score wins the job. Whether this gets you the best person for the job I'm sure is open to debate but unless you try you'll never know.

beingjdc

scousethife wrote: »

That bird who was in charge of that baby P thing was sacked and her sucessor is getting 200 grand aparently.

What in the name of satans @rsehole is that all about?

Let's assume for the sake of argument that she was in fact incompetent, rather than a convenient scapegoat for widespread failings across a system that, frankly, the Government have been lucky to divert attention from, riddled as it is with perverse targets, central form-filling, and underfunding, none of which can be blamed on an individual council.

If you advertise a job, and it turns out you didn't get anyone good enough applying to get the job done properly, do you advertise it a higher pay rate the next time, or a lower pay rate? I certainly wouldn't be impressed if my pay was cut because of my predecessor being rubbish, and neither would Harry Redknapp...

dopester

beingjdc wrote: »

Rubbish. The Director of Children's Services in Haringey is in charge of a gross annual revenue budget of £400m, and a substantial capital budget, quite apart from the level of responsibility for, you know, life or death decisions. Find me someone in the private sector who controls a budget of half a billion pounds and is paid £35k.

You are suggesting that someone at the top of their career in an extremely stressful and complex job should expect to be paid 10% less than a graduate trainee at a large London law firm. Do you think that's realistic?

How long has Children's Service existed in one form or another? How much has the budget grown over the last 10 years?

A difficult job to police and ensure parents are not abusing and mistreating their own children. It must have happened in the past though, way back before there was any money for Children's Services. Without wanting children to suffer, I think the system needs scaling back and simplifying. The funding will be cut in the near future whether you like it or not, so best to plan for that.

Are all City law firms hiring graduates? Last news article I read in Summer had many saying they would not take on new trainees next year, and others saying they would cut the starting pay.

Why are some City bankers becoming teachers, and others with real skills, taking on much lower paid jobs - such as one I know doing handyman jobs on a lot less pay?

Why.. because there is less money available to pay high wages in the system.

To answer your question, I believe there are and will be more and more capable people willing to do the job for a lot less money.

I found out on Thursday of one council funded project in my area aimed for the elderly having the funding near totally slashed. They have some new people in to answer phones, but no money to backup any commitment to the service.

dopester

Davesnave wrote: »

Britain already has some of the largest class sizes in the developed world, so I'd guess we wouldn't wish them to increase, but a severe recession, (or depression) could put the nation on almost a war footing, forcing economies of scale into every area where public money is spent.

Japan, has some of the largest class sizes, yet they still produce very competent, motivated students. Brits tend to value individualism and, in an ideal world, I'd favour that approach, but our education, like everything else, will most likely reflect the future we live in, which may be far from ideal.

Get some retired teachers in to do some voluntary work. Withhold their pensions if they don't. Or maybe pay a little extra for expenses.

Teachers are always bleating on about how much they love the job for the kids, so surely some of the retired would be willing to come back to do extra work to lower the class sizes when the government runs out of money to pay teachers their current rate of pay.

Or, have kids taught by the best teachers/lecturers via remote link telepresence - for classrooms all over the country, with a lower-paid teaching assistant in each class to oversee.

You might not like it, but the money will be running out soon, and at least my solutions have the best interests of the kids in mind - instead of striking teachers, or those teachers on long-term sick-leave on big pay, or those teachers requiring big pay to subsidise their BTL portfolios.

macaque_2

treliac wrote: »

You throw out all this nonsense without any evidence to back your rhetoric. It's just pub talk.

And, as for Mr Balls, he hadn't a real clue how to respond .... Oh, we'd better call for another enquiry.

That's you and me - we're all going to pay for the overhaul of social work (yet again :think: ). So it looks as if the govt is doing something.

Well, let's see if it stops people murdering their children.

If you don't like the facts, you dismiss them as 'pub talk'. If the mininister goes off script you suggest 'he hasn't a clue how to respond'.

You cannot stop people from killing their children but the evidence suggests that the baby p murder could have been prevented.

The catalogue of failures in the public services/quangoes grow daily. The NHS computer disaster, the home office not fit for purpose, the collapse of the child support agency, the DSS computer, Olympic games overspend, the passport office computer fiasco. Today we have a fiasco in the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and a damning report about British education from Unicef.

The decline in public services has coincided with a huge rise in the salaries and numbers of public employees. Class sizes are rising, police stations are closing, public WCs are dissapearing, care for the elderly is getting worse, bin collections have fallen, university fees are rising etc.

RobertoMoir

macaque wrote: »

The catalogue of failures in the public services/quangoes grow daily. The NHS computer disaster, the home office not fit for purpose, the collapse of the child support agency, the DSS computer, Olympic games overspend, the passport office computer fiasco. Today we have a fiasco in the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and a damning report about British education from Unicef.

If these things are happening "daily" then why do you have to use examples that happened quite a while ago? Surely with your list of 7 things you should have been able to use examples from the past two weeks? Or perhaps your talk of "daily" failures was a load of old nonsense and hyperbole?

Incidentally, how much influence in any of the above things do you think the 'average' civil servant or local government employee had? I'd personally be delighted if we stopped giving contracts to certain IT contractors who are persistently unable to deliver results, and I would also have been quite happy if we'd avoided the white elephant that the 2012 Olympics is rapidly becoming. But you know what, outside of my little sphere of influence no one asks me.

macaque wrote: »

The decline in public services has coincided with a huge rise in the salaries and numbers of public employees. Class sizes are rising, police stations are closing, public WCs are dissapearing, care for the elderly is getting worse, bin collections have fallen, university fees are rising etc.

Of course, I could make exactly the same point about banks and base a criticism of the entire private sector on those plus the crash of things like woolies and MFI. It would be totally daft and unreasonable of me, so I won't do that, but I'd be attacking the private sector with exactly the same logic and reasoning you're using.

I could also point out that some of your examples of faults in the public sector are/were typically delivered by private sector anyway, but I've already given you enough to be going on with.

pickles110564

dopester wrote: »

Withhold their pensions if they don't.

They have deserved their retirement after dealing with all the brats like you and how the system gives them no support to deal with all the thugs and disruptive kids.
They have done their time let them rest in piece and get Gordy who has screwed this country good and proper to be made to put things in place that he and his pathetic Government have been promising since they were elected.
Their catchy tune missed out the true words it should have been:- Bad Dreams and Nightmares.

macaque_2

If these things are happening "daily" then why do you have to use examples that happened quite a while ago? Surely with your list of 7 things you should have been able to use examples from the past two weeks? Or perhaps your talk of "daily" failures was a load of old nonsense and hyperbole?

Daily is what I said and daily is what I mean.

Incidentally, how much influence in any of the above things do you think the 'average' civil servant or local government employee had? I'd personally be delighted if we stopped giving contracts to certain IT contractors who are persistently unable to deliver results, and I would also have been quite happy if we'd avoided the white elephant that the 2012 Olympics is rapidly becoming. But you know what, outside of my little sphere of influence no one asks me.

I accept that some of the problems are political and the public servants are piggy in the middle. The government knew very well that they would overspend on the olympics.

Of course, I could make exactly the same point about banks and base a criticism of the entire private sector on those plus the crash of things like woolies and MFI. It would be totally daft and unreasonable of me, so I won't do that, but I'd be attacking the private sector with exactly the same logic and reasoning you're using.

The banks have behaved disgracefully but we do have the choice of taking our custom away.

I could also point out that some of your examples of faults in the public sector are/were typically delivered by private sector anyway, but I've already given you enough to be going on with.

This disgraceful abdication of responsibility h as become commonplace within the public sector in recent years. If private companies are failing to deliver, it is the fault of public servants. They are the ones negotiating the contracts, placing the orders and supervising delivery. They are ultimately the project managers and bad projects are the fault of bad project managers.

The 'them and us' astmosphere that is developing between the public and private sector is very alarming. The animosity is being driven by a number of factors. The public services are now paying themselves too much and helping themselves to pensions that the nation simply cannot afford. They are aquiring far too many powers over the lives of people. The idea that council tax assessors can force their way into a property and take photographs is an abomination in a civilised country. Finally, stories break daily about public sector incompetance and yet very few people ever lose their jobs.

I accept that ultimately that these problems are not just the fault of the public servants. Governments of all pursuasions have failed abysmally to bring the public sector under control.

RobertoMoir

macaque wrote: »

The 'them and us' astmosphere that is developing between the public and private sector is very alarming. .

And yet you never miss a chance to widen it in your own special way.