An alternative to public sector cuts.

Byline: GILL HALE

AS you read this piece, the party political conference season will be grinding to an end with the Conservatives more than halfway through their speech fest in Manchester.

Now that the hot air and the razzamatazz are almost over, one issue is emerging as the hot topic in the run-up to the next general election. Yes, I am talking about the C word.

Cuts, cuts, cuts screamed the Lib Dems. Cuts, cuts, cuts scream the Tories. And although the Labour Party talked more about efficiencies, the C word was certainly heard on the lips of no less a person than Gordon Brown.

By stepping into the ring, yet again, to defend the public sector from its highly paid, well-cushioned, bonus-earning critics, I know I'm repeating myself, but I make no apology. We will say it again and again until the message gets through: cutting jobs and services in the public sector will make things worse not better.

Let's be clear, the current economic misery and chaos that besets us all was not caused by overspending on public services such as healthcare, education, policing or public housing. It's not the product of over-generous pay rates either. Last month local government workers accepted a pay offer that takes the lowest paid over the pounds 12,000 a year threshold for the first time. Not many of those workers feel the need to transfer their funds to the Cayman Islands.

No, our current public sector deficit is the direct result of pounds 135bn spent in bailing out the banks. A bail out made necessary by the catastrophic breakdown of a greedy financial system, overseen by a self-serving, bloated elite that, even now, add their voices to the call for spending cuts while at the same time awarding themselves outrageous bonuses.

So, it's not our fault but everyone, it seems, has to share in the misery. And misery it is for ordinary working people suddenly finding themselves in a job centre with thousands of others, worried about their homes, their families and their pensions.

It is in such times of crisis that we need our public services more than ever. Don't believe anyone who says that the public sector is overflowing with faceless bureaucrats. Look closer and you will see caring, committed people helping us to go about our daily lives.

They keep the fabric of our communities together, getting people rehoused, giving benefit advice, looking after the most vulnerable, such as the elderly and the very young, mental health workers in the NHS helping people cope with the fallout from family breakdown, workers in colleges teaching people new skills so they don't lose hope of working again and rebuilding their lives.

But, say the politicians, we will only cut non-core, 'backroom' jobs. But who decides whether services are necessary or not? During the last Tory government, hospital cleaners were deemed expendable and their numbers were halved and jobs sold off to the highest private sector bidder. The result was dirty hospitals, MRSA and Clostridium difficile. Expendable? Perhaps not.

Besides, how much fat can there be left to trim? Local councils have already saved billions: 50% more efficiencies than required by the government, while 8,000 jobs have disappeared nationally this year alone with plans for more in the next few years. Even leading economists have highlighted the dangers of cutting public spending, warning that it would transform a 'recession' into a 'depression'.

Moreover, it might not be the election winner that the political leaders think it is. A Mori poll in June this year showed that only 29% of those asked wanted reduced government borrowing and cuts to services, compared with 69% who wanted to see them left as they are or even increased.

This bears out what my union, Unison, has found during our Million Voices For Change campaign, which calls for social justice, jobs and quality public services. We believe there is an alternative to cuts, an alternative that involves fair and increased taxation, that recognises the wider benefits of public services to the economy and society and that sees this as a route out of recession.

Ordinary people queue to sign up in droves when this powerful alternative message is explained. Let's hope that the politicians get the message too.

Gill Hale is regional secretary for Unison Northern.