The Guardian recently featured private sector management cost cutting techniques and questioned how suitable they were for public services. Lean thinking, value mapping, continuous improvement and propertiy reviews were among the suggested fads in a sweeney todd style barbers kit bag for public sector managers gearing up for budget cuts.
Some of these concepts were at the core of best value reviews and will be known to UNISON negotiators. Mo Baines of APSE (and former UNISON Manchester branch secretary) comments that continuous improvement has become embedded in councils and, turning the tables, said "I think the private sector can learn from the public service ethos and from some elements of sharing good practice."
Also, the report noted that 'the strength of unions within the public sector means changes to working practices may take longer to introduce than in the private sector'.
Dave Prentis is quoted warning against "falling into the trap of thinking private sector values are the magic bullet for saving the public sector money has caused huge problems. You only need to look at the example of hospital cleaning, where selling off contracts to the lowest bidder sparked a race to the bottom. This caused hospital-acquired infections to skyrocket when cleaners were cut to save cash."
http://www.guardianpublic.co.uk/public-sector-cost-cutting-techniques
