Major job cuts in the public sector are unavoidable, according to Adrian Slater, director at recruitment outsourcer Alexander Mann Solutions.

Yesterday, a BBC survey revealed that 10% of local government jobs could go.

Slater says: “Although previous downturns have brought predictions of widespread job cuts in the public sector, these headcount reductions have rarely led to employees actually losing their jobs. Recruitment freezes and voluntary attrition have generally allowed public sector employers to balance the books without cutting staff.  However, with current conditions far more severe than in previous years, significant job cuts are going to be unavoidable.
 
“In these circumstances, the expectation is often that older workers, usually among an organisation’s higher earners, will be the first to go. This can be hugely damaging since, although losing these individuals might appear to deliver a bigger cost-saving in the short-term, they represent the kind of transferable skills and experience that add a huge amount of value to an organisation.”
 

But a spokesperson for Northumberland County Council told Recruiter that the council would be cutting 250 posts from 16,000 made up of voluntary redundancies and the deletion of vacant posts. “It is not as bad as we first feared,” the spokesperson added.

And Sam Strange, director of the business support unit – part of the Recruitment and Employment Confederation’s academy for business, says job cuts will mean recruiters may need to look at operating in other sectors other than the public sector to mitigate the risk.

“Whereas a year ago we saw many agencies looking to move into the public sector, we are now seeing a reverse trend. Recruiters with a public sector-focused portfolio are looking at other possible sectors to move into due to the inevitable squeeze on public expenditure. Recruiters are more aware than ever of the need to pre-empt external developments and to seize new opportunities in extremely uncertain and fast-changing times.”