Emergency budget – will public sector pay cuts be imposed in 2011?‏

Prominent in yesterday’s papers were reports of the Prime Minister’s warning that ‘the public sector will bear the brunt of the cuts’. http://bit.ly/94Pa8n

The PCS civil service union was quick off the mark to reject this latest attack and rightly so. http://bit.ly/ajiFqx

But anyone aware of the austerity measure sweeping across EU member states will not be fooled by the idea that Cameron is operating to an independent Con Dem agenda for the UK economy and labour market. It is noteworthy that the IMF has backed Spain’s austerity measures including 5% public sector pay cuts. “Spain is taking the right measures for economic stability said Dominique Strauss-Kahn the head of the International Monetary Fund and called on all Spaniards to back the government's austerity work”.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/10349212.stm


Who would bet against similar measures including centrally imposed pay cuts pay cuts being announced by Chancellor Osborne tomorrow? The key question is how will Britain's public sector unions respond to such an attack?

The local mobilisations planned for tomorrow must be the start of co-ordinated and sustained resistance.