Halt public sector job cuts, warns CIPD

Halt public sector job cuts, warns CIPD

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development has called on the Chancellor to announce a temporary halt to further public sector job cuts as part of any broader plan to stimulate economic growth and combat rising unemployment.

The organisation says in its Work Audit report, ‘Public sector job cuts revisited',  that the public sector shed almost a quarter of a million jobs in the government's first year of office, with public sector job losses in the first quarter of the current financial year (2011-12) already five times greater than projected by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) for the entire year.

Taking figures on actual public sector job losses together with the existing OBR projection, this implies a total loss of more than 600,000 public sector jobs between 2010-11 and 2015-16 - a third more than ministers say they expect.

Dr John Philpott, the CIPD's chief economic adviser, said: "With the economy and labour market in such a fragile condition, it is worrying that public sector job losses are turning out to be much greater than ministers have previously been suggesting.

"Public sector job cuts in this context are a false economy, adding to unemployment and in turn hindering rather than helping the task of fiscal deficit reduction.

"A more sensible course would be to delay public sector job cuts to the end of this Parliament and if necessary into the next, thereby enabling them to be absorbed more easily without nasty macroeconomic side-effects."

He said the government's plan for growth must rightly contain measures to stimulate private sector job creation πbut the Chancellor should also avoid the own goal of cutting public sector jobs at a time of high and rising unemployment."


  • 10 Oct 2011