The main problem with the cuts at local level is the speed. This speed does not allow the councils enough time to implement or manage the cuts in a more efficient and controlled manner were cost efficient methods or solutions can be found or even to allow councillors to understand how their voters want services to be prioritised and therefore plan a controlled reduction is services.
I do agree with the coalition that more power should be with local councillors to decide what should be cut which means that less services should be ring fenced. Because if we elect local politicians to make local decision than it is for them to be held to account and for them to prioritise their spending on our behalf. Otherwise if there is to much top down decision making, it makes voting for a local councillor redundant and less clear cut.
I also agree with the accusation directed at Eric Pickles (Communities Secretary) on gunboat diplomacy. You should let councillors make their decisions locally or you control them from above, you can't do both. Eric Pickles can't be promoting localism while telling councils what to do.
public spending, the deficit, and the national debt are all still going up significantly
ReplyDeletethey are just not going up as fast as labour would have liked
to talk of "cuts" as is fashionable in the media is just nonsense when public spending is still going UP so fast
personally i would like to see real terms cuts, and a plan to bring the national debt and not just the deficit down to zero
there are lots of tax raising measures which could be done to balance the books, tax foreign workers the same as brits, tax companies using tax havens to avoid tax, and so on
there are lots of obvious cuts, cut the size of the MOD civil servants in half, cut the printing of leaflets in languages other than english by the public sector, stop foreign workers and their families in this country using the nhs or state schools make them pay commerical prices like brits do abroad
common sense has gone and hype and bullshit has taken over