Let Down By Con-Dems Fail Communities

David Cameron's mantra "we're all in it together" has all the malice and dishonesty of his hero Margaret Thatcher's equally duplicitous slogan "there is no alternative."

Nothing sums up Con-Dem duplicity more than the studied cynicism of the coalition government's Localism Bill launched yesterday by Eric Pickles.

Stripped of the Communities Secretary's slippery misleading rhetoric, the Bill is a naked assault on current jobs and services and equally on local councils as democratically accountable deliverers of essential services.

The government's sweeping reductions to local authority funding in England will result without doubt in savage cuts to employment and service provision, yet Pickles insists that local authorities will be able to do "more for less."

He claims to be guided by advice from the Local Government Association over what councils can manage by way of a reduction in their spending powers.

But the LGA warned three weeks ago that 140,000 local authority jobs are expected to be axed as a result of spending cuts, a full 40 per cent higher than originally estimated in response to the government's October comprehensive spending review.The reason for this is the coalition's determination to frontload many of the cuts into the first year of the four-year spending review.

LGA chairwoman Margaret Eaton said that councils had known that cuts funding cuts were on the way and had trimmed their budgets in expectation.

"But the unexpected severity of the cuts that will have to be made next year will put many councils in an unprecedented and difficult position."

Ministers claim that this savagery is necessary to convince international speculators - called euphemistically "investors" - that the government is acting decisively to tackle the deficit, for which bankers' reckless speculation was largely to blame.

But they are also seizing the window of opportunity to drive through changes that will alter the face of the country, approaching their goal of a slimmed-down state.

That's what lies behind Pickles's chatter about "a new constitutional arrangement" aimed at shifting power down to localities.

He speaks of local people banding together as volunteers to run libraries, post offices and community centres as though these facilities were on a par with managing a local shop.

They are staffed by professionals trained to carry out their duties and, aside from the issue of such people being forced out of their jobs, it is highly unlikely that untrained local groups would be able to take over.

Nor does the Communities Secretary accept any responsibility for a safety net in the event of services being taken on unsuccessfully by volunteer groups. Effectively, the government is washing its hands of its responsibility to fund local services.

And that responsibility is definitely national since government has seized control of local funding through a number of measures, including centralising business rates and capping council tax levels.

The government's perverse decision to increase funding for some of the most prosperous local authorities and to slash that of some of the poorest makes a mockery of "all in it together."

Those at the sharp end of this cynical Con-Dem assault have no choice but to resist it.

Trade unions cannot merely rely on condemnation of these criminal cuts. They have to unite, drawing in communities, to win the arguments and oppose the cuts effectively by every means, including co-ordinated industrial action.

Black Day For Our Public Services

Government plans to grant more power to local communities were exposed by unions today as a sham to disguise huge job cuts and the privatisation of public services.

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles unveiled the Localism Bill which he claimed would be a "ground-breaking shift in power to councils and communities" from central government and would start a new era of "people power."

He described the Bill as a way of empowering communities where local people would be encouraged to compete against private firms to bid to run services.

"This powerful series of measures puts new rights in law for people to protect, improve and even run important front-line services," he claimed.

"For too long people have been powerless to intervene as vital community resources disappear."

Mr Pickles added: "I am expecting councils to provide more for less and a reasonable level of service."

But the Unison union's head of local government Heather Wakefield said the huge job losses faced by councils meant Mr Pickles's claims were simply not possible.

The Local Government Association predicted last month that 140,000 council jobs will go over the next four years as the cuts announced in the Comprehensive Spending Review begin to bite.

The Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accounting also predicted that 70,000 of those could come go in the next year alone.

"Eric Pickles may talk about local authorities doing more with less but the public should not be fooled - this is not possible," Ms Wakefield said.

She labelled the day "Miserable Monday" for workers and councils across the country and delivered a litany of the services at risk from the Tory axe.

"Vital local services such as libraries and day centres are already shutting their doors.

"Charges for others such as home care for the elderly and meals on wheels are on the up," Ms Wakefield said.

"Meanwhile, the bankers are still in line for their massive Christmas bonuses. Why are hard-working families paying the price for a recession they did not cause?"

London School of Economics Professor Tony Travers said: "There's no doubt that it will be unlike anything that has been seen before in modern times.

"The scale of reduction in grants, which will be 27 per cent over four years, is without precedent and it's very hard for local authorities to do that without any effect for front-line service."

The Bill will also introduce a "community right to build," giving towns and villages powers to build new homes and amenities.

The National Housing Federation has calculated that councils in the north will lose £104 million a year while those in the south will gain £342m when the scheme is fully operational.