Weathering a perfect storm (From Bournemouth Echo)

Weathering a perfect storm

9:00am Tuesday 2nd March 2010 in

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THE extent of just how severely local councils will be affected by budget cuts in future is slowly becoming clearer.

And so is the effect this will have on the public. Yesterday we reported the response of most of Dorset’s local authorities as to how they plan to manage their finances as the public sector spending squeeze tightens.

Understandably, council leaders are reluctant to be too specific at this stage about where the axe will fall and how jobs may have to go.

The furthest anyone was willing to go was Bournemouth’s deputy leader, John Beesley, who said “clearly there will be quite a number.” He added that a non replacement policy had meant no compulsory redundancies so far but “you can only do that for so long.” Our survey coincided with a much larger one carried out by the BBC which predicts that tens of thousands of town hall jobs could be at risk as councils struggle to deal with the fallout from the recession. The Local Government Association says that councils have been hit by a “perfect storm” and would little choice but to shed jobs. Massive efficiencies are needed but even these are unlikely to be enough. Sources of income have dropped sharply as more and more people are turning to councils to help through tough times.

Whether you work in local government or consume local services, hang onto your hat. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.