Public sector reform: you can't fix it by cutting those delivering it

The Herald Scotland

2 days ago

Read more from Roz Foyer:
Let me be clear: the workers of these services were heroic. Their efforts cannot be forgotten, and ministers would do well to remember this as they plot their savings. It was the infrastructure surrounding them – lack of sick pay, poor planning and the complete absence of enforcement of covid regulations – as well as the under-resourcing of crucial sectors such as social care that meant workers were thrown to the wolves. If reforms of our public services are to mean anything, then our message is simple: you can't fix public services by cutting the people who deliver them. It's illogical to talk about reducing headcount while NHS waiting times, A&E delays and social care backlogs are at crisis levels all while local government has been effectively gutted.
Scotland deserves high-quality public services that are fully funded, resilient and responsive. That means investing in the workforce, not undermining it. In many ways, we've seen this story before.
Just a few years ago, Kate Forbes attempted to reduce the number of public sector jobs to 'pre-pandemic' levels, with some 30,000 workers to be sent packing. The move was quickly jettisoned. But it's clear to see that reform of our public services has always loomed large in the background.
This aborted move followed what we saw in the early 2010s, when austerity budgets passed down from government shrunk the size of the Scottish public sector by 10%, with the local government workforce reducing by 60,000.
Despite the promises of central government that these were 'efficiencies' and government spending would be more 'targeted', what actually happened, to put it crudely, was ministers issued edicts on spending to local authorities, the Chief Executives and departmental heads of which, purely, looked at headcount and cut from there.
If council chief executives are being told to cut their cloth accordingly, it's little wonder they look immediately to their staffing costs and misguidedly assume that's the place to start. This cannot be repeated this time around.
That's not to say we are against reform, far from it. Savings can and should be made if we genuinely adhere to the Christie Commission's principles of empowerment, partnership and prevention. Campbell Christie, was of course, a former General Secretary of the STUC.
Savings can also be made if we root out the profiteers involved in so many of our public services. Take social care – up to £28 in every £100 leaks out of care homes in the form of profits, rent, payments to the directors, and interest payments on loans. Or take the outsourcing giants charging our schools £60 to change a lightbulb.
But reform to address this will require upfront investment to insource services and savings are likely to take years to materialise.
Presenting public service reform as a means to save money while simultaneously improving services is fundamentally dishonest. The reality is that across almost every developed country in the world, public spending is increasing. Years of austerity and demographic pressures, not to mention the investments needed to tackle the climate crisis, make this unavoidable.
For all the talk of AI and technological change – a point the First Minister was at pains to mention in his speeches last week – an aging population will require greater investment in services delivered by people, not machines. If I'm speaking frankly here: Alison the social care worker, not AI, administers your granny their medicine and care. That cannot be replaced, no matter how much we, as a society, seek to embrace new ways of working. There are people in our workforce – those who toiled and sacrificed during the pandemic – that cannot be cast aside just because politicians think that ChatGPT is the future.
Yes, there will be genuine savings to be found by embracing technology, we don't doubt that. Unions are proceeding with caution and with eyes open. Artificial intelligence is here and it's here to stay. If used correctly, recognising the labour of those that created the content in the first place, it can revolutionise, for good, the world of work. It could – and I stress could – correct the power dynamic between the executives and the employees. But it cannot and should not be used as a pre-requisite for efficiency savings which cost workers their livelihoods.
Before charging ahead, the Scottish Government must engage meaningfully with trade unions. We have made it clear to ministers that we will not support any plan that puts public services or public service workers at risk. Politicians across the political spectrum need to face up to the fact that total tax revenues will have to rise in the coming years.
The truth is, no matter how well-intentioned reforms of our public services are, the Scottish Government has powers of taxation that could raise up to £3.7 billion of extra revenue. This not only addresses our financial challenges, but it also gives public services the oxygen they need to breathe.
That's the real reform we need in Scotland.