In a stark example of the public services industrial complex modus operandi, the CBI employer’s organisation has called for an extra £120bn public spending cuts in order to bring the public finances into balance by 2016. The call is made in the lobby organisation’s pre-Budget report submission to the Chancellor: http://www.cbi.org.uk/pdf/20091015-cbi-pbr-submission.pdf
As well as stating its opposition to fairer taxation “there should be no moves to further increase the tax burden for business overtly or covertly” the CBI makes a pitch for “fundamental” public sector reform: “the scale of the required adjustment in spending means that strategic re-engineering of service provision is the only way to improve public sector productivity sufficiently, without politically unacceptable cuts in services. The skills necessary to achieve the required efficiency savings are scarce across the economy, but can be found to a greater extent in the private sector….. accompanying this letter is a paper setting out a menu of ideas for achieving efficiency savings in the public sector”’: http://www.cbi.org.uk/pdf/20091001-cbi-doing-more-with-less.pdf
Of course the driver for the CBI’s proposed solutions of privatisation and strategic partnerships is the self styled ‘UK public services industry’, the most advanced in the world and one which has captured a £79bn market fleecing the public purse, according to the DeAnne Julius report published last year.
Adrian Ringrose, Chairman of the CBI’s public services strategy board was interviewed in the FT last Monday to make a sales pitch to opinion formers upon publication of the above reports.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/35e5c044-bc20-11de-9426-00144feab49a.html
Ringrose is quoted as saying that contractors and voluntary groups could be involved in areas of the public sector that have hitherto been regarded as politically unpalatable – possibly even front line policing. “in implementation, there’s very little, if anything – perhaps other than soldiering – that the state should have an exclusive right to” and, observing that the impact of the banking collapse had created propitious environment for the private sector vultures, he stated: “I think that’s a very constructive environment for a radical redefinition of how public services should be delivered ... It’s been driven more by necessity than by an aspirational philosophy”.
This neatly explains the purpose of the CBI’s self serving demand to place the public sector in a financial straight jacket!
To read UNISON's official response 'CBI cuts plans threaten economic recovery' go to:
http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=1611
To read more by UNISONActive on the public service industry go to:
http://unisonactive.blogspot.com/2009/09/public-services-industrial-complex.html
