Those Who Make A Difference
The Prime Minister recently announced that the Government are going to pay public sector workers in full the salary increases recommended by the Independent Pay Review Body for 2023. I am sure that is a relief for many employees because there had been hints from Cabinet sources for weeks that they would not accept the proposals and offer much less.
A Small Step
I do not think I am being over cynical to suggest that was always a ploy. The real terms value of public sector pay has dropped like a stone since 2010, hence the high demands of groups such as the Doctors and teachers, so when people who have seen their standard of living diving year on year fear they will be offered 3%, then find they get circa 6% plus a one off payment, it lessens their frustration and anger, and makes them more amenable to accepting. Teaching Unions are already recommending acceptance; doctors’ representatives are not. These are groups who do not wish to strike because it hurts those to whom they are dedicated. It got me thinking once again about those who really make a difference to the lives of others in their work, and why we allow them to be so poorly paid.
In my view we desperately want to attract quality staff into our Prison Service; our Police Service; our Hospitals, in particular those for people with mental health struggles; our care homes and hospices. People who want to improve lives of others. These jobs are tough, depressing, often dirty and difficult, and the deserved thanks to those who choose to do them is not reflected in their bank account each month. Any desire to recruit more people for these tasks is counterbalanced by those leaving, disillusioned and burnt out whilst seeing their standard of living dropping.
Money For Value
The Prime Minister said that the award for those who are not permitted to strike would be highest, including Prison Officers, but will it be enough to stem the loss of experienced people? There has to be greater effort to retain good staff, those very people who came into the service to make that vital difference to society by helping those inside prison to turn their lives around and prepare to make a positive contribution to society when they walk out of the gates. Shortages of staff make that task virtually impossible as the role becomes one of control and safety management, not of social interaction and education.
We certainly want teachers who are enthusiastic about their desire to impact on those in their classes, whether adults or children, and able to achieve that. We can all recall teachers who inspired us, and pushed us forwards in our feelings of self-worth, and unfortunately those who did not. Inspiring teachers build lives, and should be properly rewarded for that. I have always advocated paying top wages to teachers in failing schools to attract talent who might otherwise drift to “easier” establishments in wealthy neighbourhoods, so they are there to teach young people in danger of dropping out of education and drifting into criminality. We also need more in adult education as too many people leave unable to read, write, and do basic arithmetic having been failed by the current system. There are also those special people who choose to teach in prisons, a far from comfortable job that takes commitment and skill. Their financial reward for this should not leave them exploited and underpaid. Salary levels should be an incentive. At present they are not.
In my opinion we are all colluding in the exploitation of those striving to make a difference if we tolerate them being underpaid whilst we complain about how much we give in tax. This year’s pay awards may be a partial recognition of their worth but are probably just a reaction to months of industrial disputes that have impacted on life in Britain. We surely know the value of their work, and they should get the money to reflect that value.
Incentives To Productivity
It has always been ironic that to get a wealthy businessperson to work harder and productively we are told we must pay them more money, but to get the workers who actually create the wealth for them we have to pay them less or they get lazy. When I look at people working in stressful, dirty, dangerous, conditions I often think that I really would not like that job. I could not work in a home for the elderly with the difficulties that creates, or as a Prison Officer having seen the situations they face on a day to day basis. I could not work as a nurse with the likelihood of facing people dying or seriously injured and liable to be assaulted, or as a Doctor who would take life and death decisions at short notice. And sure as anything I would not like to work as a teacher in a classroom, where I might face someone with the disruptive sense of humour I had at school, or in prison where situations of personal danger arise and tact and skill is needed to steer out of that as well as ability to teach to sometimes difficult people in a classroom in the worst place to learn in the world.
However I have never seen a large boardroom in which I would not comfortably want to sit, with a phalanx of junior staff all around me to whom I would delegate difficulties. Sure, I would not be as good at wealth creating as many, but it would certainly be a pleasure to try. After all, I am pretty certain that were I in charge of Thames Water I too would be perfectly capable of losing ￡83 million this year and presiding over leaked pipes all over London.
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The Efficiency Con Trick
As the Prime Minister announced the pay awards, he said that the Education Department would get extra money, but all other services would need to fund the increase out of savings from current budgets. There would be no additional funds. Some money would come from additional charges on Migrants for use of the Health Service, the rest from “efficiency savings and new priorities.” Ignoring the problems of implementing the former of those and assuming that is going to happen for the sake of a short article, efficiency savings are always the fall-back position, and totally unachievable unless you mean staff cuts.
Taking the Prison Service, the thought that there is money floating around being wasted on fringe projects is risible and it is hard to see how this will generate anything like the sum required. Planned maintenance budgets are shot to pieces, and administrative staff have been severely cut back year on year. There are only two ways to achieve this, and the first is reducing staff levels by slowing down recruitment, and that is a very slippery slope as shortages of staff lead to failings in the service, pressures within prisons, and more staff leaving. However there is another way. Cut down the numbers in prison by not locking up non-violent people on short sentences. Yet Government policy is going in completely the opposite direction including locking up more people for causing annoyance by walking slowly and peacefully down the middle of the road, and therefore costing more and more money to keep them in prison. The time it takes to get to trial keeps increasing, and soon there will be a waiting list to get locked up after conviction. Ridiculous.
Death By A Thousand Cuts
I welcome that public service workers have received a halfway reasonable pay increase this year, even though I personally do not think it will ease the problem of recruitment and retention, and fear that services will once again suffer as bits are chopped away to find savings so much needed change will not come. For instance, the Chief Inspector of Prisons has just reported on his, and OFSTED’s, concern over the failure of prison education to increase reading levels of those inside. When cuts, or efficiency savings as the Government want to call them, are made, this type of increased service is less likely unless it diverts resources away from other educational opportunities now offered that are just as important in developing people’s ability to find a new start when they step out.
It should no longer be policy to just patch things up. You cannot do that for ever without the severe harm that seems to be everywhere now. Each experienced and quality officer who leaves the Prison Service, each long serving nurse or police officer, each empathetic staff member at a care home, or each burnt out teacher who quits because they are undervalued, cannot be replaced and society is diminished. There comes a time when, as prisoners in ancient China used to find, the torture of a thousand cuts ensures fatality as the blood has all drained away.
Wanted: Radical Change
If there is not a change of thinking in society as a whole, these matters will not, indeed cannot, be resolved. We do spend a lot of time worrying about not upsetting wealthy people by overtaxing them in case they stop doing whatever it is they are doing, but I feel that taxation has to be rebalanced to ensure everyone pays a fair proportion of their income, earned or unearned, to keep our society running and indeed improve it. It is surely to the benefit of the entrepreneur that Britain is a country at peace with itself, and not a split society with a minority very comfortable indeed and far too many with no comfort at all, particularly if they are looking after our key services. Even if taxed more I reckon the wealthy will want to continue making more money. What else would they do with their time?
But just looking at Criminal Justice, if we cut back on the number of people being sent to prison by not locking up non violent petty offenders but putting them on to quality local programmes, we would save around ￡47,000 per head per year. We would not need to spend vast capital resources on building new jails. We could use all that money to improve community sentences, adult education, and above all mental health provision which would benefit so many people. And good community schemes will also benefit everyone. This is not just my view but is also the view of a lot of people who actually know what they are talking about!
That would involve a courageous political approach as the press would leap up and down in feigned fury at the suggestion that criminals would be roaming the streets in a lawless society and peaceful protesters would continue to carry banners down the road. I regret that part of the reason for our current position in our own present day Slough of Despond, is lack of vision from the politicians from all sides who should be dynamic but are just content to accept the status quo, without wanting to upset anyone. And certainly not upset anyone with money, a large media presence, and thereby undue influence.