CSR predictions

[Four Cofffee]

I work extensively with the public sector who in reality had been gearing up for a change in Govt. and cuts for about 12 months before the election. There now seems to be loads of planning going on for how cuts could be made but oddly the 'people' seem to think their jobs are safe. I am not so sure that even a 5-10% cut in a dept budget can be absorbed when most of them have over 85% of their costs in staffing. Just 5% off a school budget wil mean teaching assistants will get a P45 and I cannot see PCSOs and HCAs and the like survining if it comes down to losing police officers, nurses or their assistants.

I have noticed lots of posturing from some public services trying to make sure they don't come out worst (for example the police have given warnings about terrorism, and I see one of the local forces saying it will have to lose over police 200 officers).

I was wondering what predictions people had for where the axe may fall?

[Bing o]

Four Cofffee said:

I was wondering what predictions people had for where the axe may fall?

People who work extensively with the public sector....

[markcoznottz]

Four Cofffee said:

I work extensively with the public sector who in reality had been gearing up for a change in Govt. and cuts for about 12 months before the election. There now seems to be loads of planning going on for how cuts could be made but oddly the 'people' seem to think their jobs are safe. I am not so sure that even a 5-10% cut in a dept budget can be absorbed when most of them have over 85% of their costs in staffing. Just 5% off a school budget wil mean teaching assistants will get a P45 and I cannot see PCSOs and HCAs and the like survining if it comes down to losing police officers, nurses or their assistants.

I have noticed lots of posturing from some public services trying to make sure they don't come out worst (for example the police have given warnings about terrorism, and I see one of the local forces saying it will have to lose over police 200 officers).


I was wondering what predictions people had for where the axe may fall?

Easy. Identify pen pushing cardboard cut out non job pen pushers. Get rid. Job done.

[strudel]

Consultants - the amount of money that was spent on them when I worked in the public sector was eye watering.

[IainT]

strudel said:

Consultants - the amount of money that was spent on them when I worked in the public sector was eye watering.

Indeed this is the case with some but not all. Oddly enough it's the PR/Management/bks consultants that seem to earn top wedge at our place and the IT types that have below market rates offered.

I've seen management consultants in for 6 months+ on ~£1500 a day. Madness.

Most of our spend (we're 40% govt subsidised, the rest comes from ticketing and other charging) is capital rather than staffing which has already been reduced by >15%.

We've already cut our spend by ~40% including those staffing reductions so it's unlikely that further cuts will be without extreme pain. The cuts already made may not be taken into account when our budget is reviewed by central govt and, as I see it, our only recourse would be to raise fares or cut services as I doubt we can make £1bn per year further savings.

[Puggit]

So based on the post above, would it be fair to say that we're not really paying top whack for public sector CxO level jobs for people with skills?

We're actually paying top whack for public sector CxOs to spend top whack on consultants, whilst pretending they are the capable ones?

[IainT]

Puggit said:

So based on the post above, would it be fair to say that we're not really paying top whack for public sector CxO level jobs for people with skills?

We're actually paying top whack for public sector CxOs to spend top whack on consultants, whilst pretending they are the capable ones?

There's some truth in that although all the silly-money consultants were ousted from here about a year ago. Funnily enough the new system we have stops us paying market rate for certain high-value skills (e.g. SAP devs) so we end up farming work out to 3rd parties who charge a small fortune.

We've tried training people up internally but, as soon as they have enough skills, they sod off contracting at a lot more than salried rates could match.

We're not PS though, we're mostly self-funded but the same procurement rules apply and we're very heavily unionised (unfotunately). Essentially we're a quango.

[Fittster]

There won't be any cuts, just a reduction in increases

"According to this year’s budget plans, public current spending will rise from £600.6 billion in 2009-10, the last Labour year, to £692.7 billion in 2014-15, the last planned year of the Coalition government in this Parliament. That’s a rise of £92.7 billion, or more than 15%: a rise of £1500 for every man,woman and child in the UK.

Total spending including capital will rise from £669.3 billion in 2009-10 to £737.5 billion, a rise of £68.2 billion"

http://www.johnredwoodsdiary.com/?p=6798

[StevieBee]

strudel said:

Consultants - the amount of money that was spent on them when I worked in the public sector was eye watering.

Yes and no!

I think external suppliers and consultants will be more relied upon than before as less people will be available internally to do the same amount of work. There will be some cross department absorption but still a great deal that needs out-sourcing.

What will (should) change is the way consultants are managed and how the public sector interacts with them.

We too deal with the public sector in the field of

IainT said:

PR/Management/bks

as Mr IainT so poetically puts it (although I would dearly love to know those councils paying £1500 a day!!!).

We are starting see tenders coming through to provide services that would normally be carried out by a Marketing Communications Officer, a job normally commanding a salary of around £22k - £25k. The fees available for one such tender tender was in the region of £5k. The specification describes duties that would normally be provided by us as part of overall project management with the fees included within the deliverables such as graphic design, printing, etc. We’ve thus been able to go back to them and offer to do this work free of charge on the proviso that we get to do the design, printing, etc.. This, they are happy with.

Now, compare that to a year ago when we bid for a £170k project to support a series of events. The bid was very specific but we identified a way whereby we could also provide the actual events free of charge and so adjusted our approach to use that additional money (£50k) on the marketing adding considerable value to what would have been done.

We lost because the events had been tendered separately and so our bid ended up being £50k too expensive – even though had they gone with us, they’d have saved £50k in total across both and reached considerably more people. It boiled down to the fact that processes had been followed that they we not prepared to adjust, even if it ended up costing them more than it needed to.

It’s this adherence to box-ticking procedure that should change.

[Four Cofffee]

Bing o said:

Four Cofffee said:

I was wondering what predictions people had for where the axe may fall?

People who work extensively with the public sector....

Already seeing it. Since May not a single bit of work from one groups of our public sector clients, which is 50% of our turnover. I am thin king that if the dept is quiet as they have no money the staff will be first in line for the chop, which will deskill them for any time they do need to do a bit. Luckily we have a signed contract for 3 years work, and had seen the gravy train running into the buffers and had shifted the effort to the private sector otherwise and squirrelled some reserveves away it would have been pretty grim.

Edited by Four Cofffee on Tuesday 31st August 15:55