The
Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) has accused the Conservative Party
of gambling with the future of public services after shadow chancellor Oliver Letwin vowed to ‘thin down’ the Civil Service.
The
PCS is presently balloting members on whether to stage a 24-hour strike over
government plans to shed 100,000 jobs from the Civil Service.
Responding
to Letwin’s comments, made at the Conservative Party
conference in Bournemouth, Mark Serwotka, PCS general
secretary, said the Tories had given no real thought of how it will impact on
the services relied on by the public.
"First
of all we have the Government planning to cull more than 100,000 civil and
public service jobs, now we have the Tories saying we’ll see your 100,000 and
raise you,” he said. “It’s a dangerous game of poker the Tories and the
Government are playing where the chips are public services and the stakes are
people’s lives.
"Civil
servants aren’t faceless bureaucrats as the Tories would have us believe, but
deliver essential services we all take for granted – such as winter fuel
payments and child benefit up and down the country,” Serwotka
said.
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