I remain critical of the Welsh Assembly Government economic policies and believe that Wales public sector at its current level is unsustainable in the long term, but for the sake of minimising the fall out on a Welsh economy that doesn’t have sufficient growth to make up for the job losses that are coming, I hope those in charge of Wales’s Government realise the offer of deferring cuts from the Conservative/Liberal Democrat Government is essentially a political offer not economic one.
The £6 billion of cuts planned forth UK works out at a £220 million reduction for the Welsh budget this year and with an Assembly Election in 12 months they are going to be wary of reducing anything that might win them votes.
WAG’s total budget is £16 billion per year so the £220m although a sizeable some of it could be found this year if Ministers in Cardiff Bay were willing to try. As Brian Morgan in his article stated ‘For example, during the merger of the WDA into WAG in 2005, a pledge was made that this would not lead to any redundancies – (apparently we don’t do efficiency savings in Wales!). ‘The result is that after five years more than 100 people are on “gardening leave” as no posts have been found for them in the new set-up. This is despite the fact that the total numbers employed in WAG have expanded significantly with many of the new posts being introduced to oversee and monitor the work of the WDA! ,
So there are savings to be made that won’t have a drastic effect - If not the cuts will be deferred and they will simply be added to next year’s reductions to be spelt out by the new Chancellor George Osborne in his budget on June 22.
And there lies the issue of what do, most economists and financiers expect a much larger reduction from the UK Government to tackle the UK's deficit next year. so what will WAG so close to an Assembly Election that both parties after the General Election will want to win and prove they are still forces to be reckoned with.Any source
No comments:
Post a Comment