Further evidence today that the Gnats' council tax freeze is continuing to cause problems for local councils, including Highland. Job losses of the scale described can not be passed off as efficiency savings, but are actual reductions in frontline services.
I have blogged before (here and here) about the effects of the freeze. Given that the Gnats like to portray themselves as being a left of centre party, I wonder how many of the people who voted for them thought that they'd be getting cuts to local council services across the board?
And it's not just local authorities who are suffering. The Gnat government also cut the budget of development agency Highlands and Islands Enterprise by £30m, leading to a number of job losses there as well.
That's led to this little local stushie in which a highly-paid HIE official got a generous £138k pay-off from the development agency, before moving over to become Highland Council's new plannng director, at a salary of more than £100k a year. Clearly, the belt-tightening doesn't extend as far as the top levels of Highand Council.
Posts
A History of the World in Admin
6 years ago
1 comment:
The re-organisation of HIE was a stupid idea when the Tories suggested it and it's no less a stupid idea now that the SNP have implemented it.
The scale of public sector 'fat-cattery' sickens me in this country - the small businessman, the struggling worker, the private sector all have to pay for this lavish bounty to the modern day aristocracy of the public sector senior official while they busily give us less and less in return for our generosity.
Still, that's what you'll get when you vote for your chosen shade of social democrat in Scotland - just more useless officials on the make and shafting the rest of us - kick the buggers out and let the harsh winds the rest of us feel whistle around their parasitic heads for a while!
Post a Comment