A mournful concern for what happened

The unions are inviting us to "fight the ConDem plans to destroy public services." It's difficult to rouse oneself to the barricades as it's evident that public sector managers seem to be intent on beating them to it.

The latest news on the grapevine involves a local authority a few miles away. They've sent all the staff above scale 4 redundancy notices. No word of warning, just plop on the hall floor when the postie came a-calling. They will be able to apply for their own jobs, once the council's decided which of those jobs they're not going to cut.

1. Scale 4 is the unofficial aspirational entry level for graduates coming into local government posts. It's the lowest point on the scale where you earn enough to definitely be paying Income Tax and National Insurance, plus the contributions to the fully-funded-by-staff-contributions pension that the government says it can't afford despite the fact it doesn't actually cost the taxpayer anything because it's entirely funded by staff contributions. Scale 2/3 is the actual entry level for most graduates in local government. The payment rate for Scale 1 is actually below the national minimum wage.


2. The clock starts ticking on the day that you are declared redundant. You have 90 days to find alternative employment. At the end of the 90 days you are unemployed. You will notice that this council has decided to have a think about which jobs to keep, then advertise, interview and appoint after staff have received a letter of redundancy.

Touch wood, I don't think Helminthdale will be as bad as that.