FDA union warn of 100,000 job losses in the civil service

The First Division Association, the union which represents the higher castes of the civil service has issued a stark warning about the potential for job losses in the civil service. The Guardian reports:

Whitehall is facing the prospect of having to shed as many as 100,000 jobs over the next five years, the union representing senior civil servants has said.

The head of the FDA, Dave Penman, said he expected the Conservative government to continue primarily targeting staffing levels as it makes yet more swingeing cuts to public spending, leading to an even greater round of public sector job cuts than those under the coalition.

He said that, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR)’s analysis of the chancellor’s autumn statement, only 40% of the total cuts expected between the election of the coalition government in 2010 and the next general election in 2020 had been made.

Those cuts had come at the cost of around 80,000 jobs, Penman said, leading him to believe that the remaining 60% would cost a further 100,000.

With welfare cuts being at the centre of government plans, it  should surprise no one that up to 30,000 of these jobs could be in the DWP. Oddly the HMRC, the department that collects money also faces severe cuts of maybe up to 15,000.

The FDA is holding it's annual conference and have issued the following press release

In his speech at the FDA's annual conference on Thursday morning, the first civil service union conference to be held since the election, General Secretary Dave Penman will call on the new Government to ensure that the civil service is more than simply another mechanism to reduce the deficit, by offering a New Deal for civil servants.

This marks the launch of the FDA's 'New Government: New Deal' campaign.

Penman will tell delegates: "If the civil service is being tasked with delivering 21st century public services with pre-war resources, then the Government needs to demonstrate that valuing civil servants, ensuring that they have the rights skills, paying them fairly, matching commitments to resources and genuinely engaging with them are the critical elements of the new deal that needs to be struck with civil servants."