SOCIO‐ECONOMIC CONDITIONS, CENTRAL POLICIES AND LOCAL AUTHORITY STAFFING LEVELS: A COMMENT
| Author | J. G. GIBSON |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1988.tb00707.x |
| Date | 01 December 1988 |
| Published date | 01 December 1988 |
NOTES
AND
SURVEYS
SOCIO-ECONOMIC CONDITIONS, CENTRAL POLICIES
AND
LOCAL
AUTHORITY
STAFFING
LEVELS: A COMMENT
INTRODUCTION
In
his
paper ’Socimonomic conditions, central policies and local authority staffing
levels‘
(Public
Administration
Vol.
64,
Spring
1986,
pp.
69-82)
George Boyne
seeks
to derive a measure which ranks local authorities in
1980/81
according to their
staff numbers in relation to
an
estimate of their staffing requirements. He derives
ranlungs for three separate groups of local authorities:
(1)
Outer London boroughs
and metropolitan districts,
(2)
English non-metropolitan districts, and
(3)
Welsh
districts. Boyne then claims to show that staff cuts in the four years after
19801’81
during the resource squeeze imposed upon local authorities by the Thatcher govern-
ments, did not fall mainly or systematically upon those authorities defined by Boyne
as heavily staffed. He therefore concludes that ‘the indiscriminate impact of central
government pressure to reduce
staff
indicates that a more selective policy towards
public sector employment is required.’
The years since
1979
have seen a rising tension
in
central-local relations in Britain
with the Conservative governments bringing in a large number of legislative
changes
(Bramley
1985)
including the major one of the introduction of rate capping and
culminating in the drastic proposals to scrap domestic rates and replace them by
a poll tax (Secretary of State for the Environment
1986).
The period has seen a
new and increasing emphasis placed by ministers upon the need to reduce the
expenditure and manpower levels in particular local authorities marked initially
by the then Secretary of State, Michael Heseltine, in his famous ’problem of the
overspenders’ speech to the Consultative Council in November
1979
(Gibson and
Travers
1986;
Stewart
1987).
Against such a background Boyne’s published rankings of local authorities’
staffing levels in relation to needs must be regarded as of major public as well
as
academic interest. Certainly to those who follow the details of published
spending
levels by local authorities
(CIPFA,
annual) and the annual list of authorities selected
by the government for rate capping (Local Authority Associations, annual), Boyne’s
rankings contain some eye-catching surprises
-
such as the ranlung of Solihull as
the second most lavishly staffed authority amongst
54
Outer London boroughs
~~ ~
Public Administration
Vol.
66
Winter
1988
(457-461)
0
Royal Institute
of
Public Administration
ISSN
0033-3298
$3.00
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