UNISONActive is an unofficial blog produced by UNISON activists for UNISON activists. Bringing news, briefings and events from a progressive left perspective.

Wednesday 25 February 2015

Austerity job losses - bad for all but worse for some

In order to divert attention from the public sector jobs carnage caused by its austerity policies, the Conservative Party claims that ‘there are now two million more private sector jobs than there were in 2010’. A useful briefing by the Sheffield Political Economy Research Institute (SPERI) examines Tory claims that that cuts to public sector employment facilitate private sector job creation and help to ‘rebalance’ the UK’s economy. It finds that ‘since 2008 job cuts in the public sector have fallen disproportionately on the regions and devolved nations outside of London. As a result of this, London and the South East have increased their share of public sector jobs as a proportion of the national total. Interestingly, however, London has also been the region with the fastest rate of private sector job growth in this period’
http://speri.dept.shef.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Brief10-public-sector-employment-across-UK-since-financial-crisis.pdf
http://speri.dept.shef.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Brief10-public-sector-employment-across-UK-since-financial-crisis.pdf