You are:

Public sector cuts will damage the economy

10 June 2010

Responding to figures released by the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development (CIPD) today predicting a rise in unemployment to 3 million the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) has warned that public service cuts will cause enormous economic and social damage.

The union are urging the government to address staff shortages in the Department for Work and Pensions which they believe is already ill-equipped to deal with current levels of unemployment claimants.

The government appears on the brink of making major cuts to the public sector and the CIPD has warned that this could lead to unemployment rising to 3 million.

PCS strongly opposes these damaging cuts and act on the issue of fixed term appointees in DWP, where 15,000 workers were employed on short term contracts at the start of the recession. On a day-to-day basis they deal with the increase in unemployment and are responsible for helping people back into work and also processing benefits forms.

If the government fails to act to stop this rise in unemployment it risks leaving remaining DWP staff facing an unmanageable workload.

PCS deputy general secretary Hugh Lanning said: “Unemployment represents a massive financial and personal cost to our country. The best way to stop this crisis getting worse is to stop the proposed public sector cuts and invest in public services, especially those helping people back into work.

The first step toward achieving this must be to make those fixed term appointment staff permanent, otherwise we risk losing their experience in our battle against rising unemployment.

It is not sensible to force those staff from work to welfare, they would rather be paying taxes than receiving benefits.

 

View all News