City council’s job cuts programme enrages unions

UNIONS have accused Birmingham City Council of embarking on a “wholesale dismantling of public services as we know them” as the authority launched a consultation process on a three-year business plan which could see up to 8,000 jobs axed.

But council chief executive said the outline proposals “represented a new way for the council to support Birmingham people.”

Figures contained in a consultation document which has been sent to all staff show that of a workforce of 50,000, 28,500 schools posts will be ring fenced following the coalition government’s decision to protect health and education services from the cuts. Of the remaining 21,500, up to 8,000 full- and part-time roles could be lost, although more than 3,000 of these would be through transfers to new arms-length bodies.

Savings would be achieved by cutting back office functions and outsourcing some services to the voluntary sector, but some core functions, such as adult social services, would also be hit.

Mr Hughes said the council would embrace the concepts of David Cameron’s ‘Big Society’. He said: “In Birmingham, we are committed to developing an enabling and empowering council which helps individuals and communities to become increasingly self sufficient and to take more responsibility for their communities. We will support and encourage communities that want to get things done.”

But the GMB union said the job losses at Birmingham City Council came on top of 1,000 in Coventry and almost 60,000 across the country. With the government expected to announce this week the level of central government support for local authorities, the union said it was braced for further announcements.

Roger Jenkins GMB officer for Birmingham City Council said “We are witnessing the wholesale dismantling of public services as we know them in Birmingham and this is not scaremongering. There will, for example, be no remand centre for children in the city when these cuts have gone through.

“There are already three registered unemployed workers for each unfilled job vacancy in the Birmingham travel to work area before these job losses kick in. 60,910 registered unemployed are chasing 20,960 unfilled vacancies before you even consider those looking for work but not registered unemployed, students and those on incapacity benefits.”