The Government is planning job cuts

The Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, has set out his vision for ‘the fundamental reform of the British state’. His speech was one of of several harbingers this week; alongside statements by Peter Kyle, Secretary of State (SoS) for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), Wes Streeting, SoS for Health and Social Care (DHSC), and Pat McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster – the most senior minister in the Cabinet Office; as well as other media briefings by the government, and the economic policies and general direction of the Government since it took office last year. Whatever the wider political claims made by ministers, the sharp end for PCS members is that job cuts are coming our way and we must prepare to defend ourselves.

What Starmer and Kyle said

Starmer said, “If we push forward with digital reform of government – and we are going to do that, we can make massive savings, £45 billion savings in efficiency.”

Speaking on Sky News, Kyle said, that “…there are £45 billion worth of productivity and efficiency savings within government if we move to digital… more than half or about half of all transactions carried out by government are analogue, so that is for example, DVLA opening 45,000 envelopes every single day… HMRC is picking up the phone 100,000 times every day.”

Those envelopes are being opened, and those telephones are being used, by PCS members and potential members. The £45 billion ‘savings’ Kyle is referring to are essentially job losses. Kyle did not refer once to reducing the working week; to redeployment to other parts of the Civil Service, with remote and home working, for otherwise redundant staff; to strengthening areas of the Civil Service in need of more resources. Like the Prime Minister, he spoke entirely in terms of ‘savings’.

What McFadden and Streeting said

Pat McFadden said that “the central Civil Service would and can become smaller” and that any civil servants performing below expectations may be ‘incentivised’ to leave their jobs, promising a new ‘mutually agreed exits’ process. The history of the Civil Service shows that it is people in the ‘junior’ grades (e.g. operational delivery) who are generally found to be ‘under performers’ and, damningly, disproportionately disabled and ethnic minority staff. Sadly but unsurprisingly, there was no mention of equality evidence or impact analysis.

McFadden also said he wanted to see more civil servants working outside London, “where the state can get better value for money” i.e. “saving” money by employing less people in London where wages are higher. Of course in reality, it will be job cuts in London and job cuts outside London as well.

When Health Secretary Wes Streeting, was interviewed on Sky News about the absorption of NHS England functions into his Department, he bluntly said ‘yes’ to the statement “so 9,000 civil servants plus out of the door” and added, “we will be treating people with care and respect and… fairness” but he did not say how, did not talk about redeployment, and did not apologise for the way in which staff in NHS England found out about job losses and the abolition of NHS England – through the media rather than through TU consultation or even official employer channels.

The context of the Government agenda

On the 11th December 2024, The Financial Times reported, “more than 10,000 [civil service] jobs are to be set to be cut under ministers’ plans to find savings of 5 per cent to their departments in the spending review…”

On the 14th January 2025, The Guardian reported Starmer insisting that the government will be ‘ruthless’ in cutting public expenditure in this year’s summer spending review to meet their austerity-portending, self-imposed, ‘fiscal rules’.

The response of the PCS General Secretary

Given the government’s clear intent, how has PCS’ Left Unity General Secretary responded? Her reply can be read here. Fighting words they ain’t. The GS pleads for members interests to be “…taken into account by providing them with job security and good pay and conditions.” The Government will say ‘yes’ because ‘taken into account’ is vague enough for anybody to sign up to.

The GS states, “We agree technology has a part to play in improving public services and enhancing our members’ job satisfaction, but we are also clear that it cannot be used as a blunt instrument to cut jobs”. Her preference, it seems, is for Ministers to use technology as a scalpel to cut jobs. Ministers will agree, because it will cost them nothing, will make them looker nicer and more competent than the Tories when in government – the lowest of bars – and they still get to cut, albeit not with a ‘blunt instrument’.

She argues, “Any proposals for changing the way our members work must be done in full consultation with the unions.” The GS does not demand agreement, or set any criteria, or define consultation more rigorously, or set out any counter proposals. Labour ministers will of course be happy to ‘consult’ as they have seen how passively and ineffectively the GS, the President Martin Cavanagh, and the rest of LU’s decrepit leadership responded to the earlier ministerial decision that all civil servants must attend their workplaces for at least 60% of the time. We have heard sweet nothing about her consultation on that issue.

She banally comments, as if somehow it is a clever play on words, “Labour says it is fixing the state so that it works for working people. Civil servants are working people, so this plan must also work for them.” Ministers will say their plan will do because it will (supposedly) make Britain stronger for everyone.

Nowhere does the GS simply say we are opposed to job cuts and redundancies and we will resist them. She contents herself with passive statements.

What the PCS Independent Left would have said

The IL has long argued for, and would have called for, an agreement on AI, so that the union has control over its use; so that members impacted by AI are given new duties or a new post; and so that members share in productivity gains by way of higher wages and a shorter working week.

We would have called for equality impact analysis of all government and management proposals (an elementary duty LU has a weak record on).

We would have said, “You want a state sector that delivers better? Our union has many policies that would strengthen democratic rights, empower people in their workplaces and communities, and improve public services. We want to discuss them with you.” 

We would outline some of PCS policies and seek consultation on our proposals as well as the Government’s. Real consultation with a view to reaching agreement (and, if contractual rights are involved, by agreement) is a two-way affair in which the ideas and aims of both parties are considered.

We would set out criticisms of Rachel Reeves’ fiscal rules, which are self-imposed, austerity loaded, and are leading not only to attacks on our members but upon working class people more generally, on the Winter Fuel Allowance, on disability benefits, etc.

We would prepare to defend members by drawing up plans for political action, legal action, campaigning and of course industrial action – strikes and action short of a strike. The Government would know that we have leverage whenever we walk into the negotiating room.

Instead Left Unity, in the guise of the General Secretary, are simply saying ‘please talk to us.’

Blaming the Civil Service – an old clichéd practice

The Tories under Thatcher and Major, then New Labour, then under the Tories again, and now under new ‘New Labour’, have proposed and implemented ‘reforms’ to the Civil Service and the wider public sector, always with the declared aim of making the Civil Service and wider public sector more efficient (because apparently, we routinely failed to ‘deliver’) and, often, to move functions into the private sector.

To one extent or another the Civil Service and wider public sector was identified (a.k.a. scapegoated) as the cause of malaise and decline in Britain and a barrier to growth. But the next round of politicians always found it necessary to embark upon new, fundamental, reforms despite their predecessors efforts – and failures. Because none of these changes made any difference to the real problems Britain faces (but for which we are still scapegoated for; the relative, long term, economic weaknesses of British capitalism.

The IL would do for PCS what the union does not do with LU controlling the GS, the Presidency and the union’s HQ and staff: we would make the political and socio-economic case for properly funding, resourcing, and empowering the public sector and we would identify the real causes of malaise and decline in Britain. It was not public sector workers who caused the international financial crisis of 2008 and it was not public sector workers who have hollowed out the infrastructure of Britain in the long years of austerity.  

Vote for IL and other Coalition for Change candidates

The GS gets away with her passivity, complacency, and her bland, vacuous messages because LU bureaucratically and undemocratically abuse their control of the union via the office of GS, office of President, brazenly installed allies in well-renumerated senior staff posts, and their minority membership on the NEC to block democratic (majority) decision-making by the NEC and to give her political cover.

If PCS IL and our partners in the Coalition for Change (CfC) win a sweeping NEC majority then PCS will start to act as a real union rather than a pressure group and LU electoral campaign machine. Read our joint platform and vote for Coalition candidates.