Public sector growth in frontline staff not bureaucrats, says IPPR
A leading thinktank has said that the increased growth in public sector employment refers to frontline staff, not administrators as some have claimed.
The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) said that there has been very little change in the balance of public to private sector employment since 1997 and that public sector employment remains a significantly lower share of the total than in 1992.
Its findings run contrary to the Conservatives’ repeated claim that it is administrators, rather than doctors and nurses, being employed by the NHS.
Richard Brooks, a senior research fellow at the IPPR, said: “Since 1998 the Labour government has significantly increased public sector employment in education and health care, but not in other areas.
“The growth in public sector employment has not been driven by increased employment of central or local government administrative staff.
“As a result, a higher proportion of public sector jobs are now providing frontline services in health and education.”
In terms of recruitment to the public services, the report suggests that more attention needs to be paid to local, not regional levels. All political parties have been vocal about the need to retain and recruit key staff in the South East and London and the Government has announced a number of key worker pay bonuses and housing assistance for these locations.
However, the IPRR suggests that there are problems with staff vacancies outside the south, notably in Shropshire, Herefordshire, Birmingham and Solihull. It calls for more consideration on “how these could be addressed with more effective local, not regional, pay solutions.”
The Tax Payers Alliance has expressed cynicism about the IPPR figures. Its chairman, Andrew Allum said: “IPPR’s report uses official statistics to show that the number of people employed by the public sector to provide healthcare and education has increased by 473,000 since 1997, compared to an additional 37,000 civil servants. But IPPR seem to think that every additional public sector worker in healthcare and education is a doctor, a nurse or a teacher. This is wrong. IPPR are misleading taxpayers.
“The number of NHS managers is increasing three times as fast as the number of new doctors and nurses. The number of new bureaucrats and support staff in education has increased twice as fast as the number of new teachers. Labour’s public sector jobs boom is not directed at front line services, it’s simply bureaucracy building.”
