UK public sector employment at record low
By
Margot Miller
2 October 2017
The loss of a million public sector jobs since 2010 has reduced the public sector share of total employment to just 16.9 percent. This figure, published by the GMB trade union, was down from 17.1 percent in 2016, 22 percent in 2009 and an all-time high of 30.6 percent in 1977. The estimate is derived from a report compiled by the Office for National Statistics (ONS)—Public Sector Employment June 2017.
Seven years ago there were 6.4 million employed in the public sector. Today the figure is down to 5.33 million. Most jobs lost are from local government, which provides essential services including education, transport, planning, fire and public safety, social care, libraries, waste management and trading standards.
According to the ONS, local government jobs fell to 2.115 million, the lowest figure since records began in 1999. The national civil service had 423,000 employees as of June 2017, which the GMB calculated as an 18.2 percent drop from 517,000 in 2010.
The scale of austerity imposed in the last decade is evident in the fact that even under the Conservative Thatcher government of the 1980s—which privatized swathes of industry including the major utilities, car production, shipbuilding and steel—the share of the public sector was never lower than 20 percent.
The ruling elite are seeking to return social conditions to the Victorian era, pre-dating the introduction of the post-World War II welfare state. How far this has gone is indicated in the fact that public sector employment is now at its lowest since 1947, the year before the foundation of the National Health Service (NHS).
The jobs have mostly gone in councils in the main towns and cities nationwide. These are run, in the…