Insider Media Limited

The West Midlands is preparing itself as thousands of public sector jobs face the axe. Following Warwickshire County Council’s revelation that it will cut up to 1,850 jobs, trade union GMB said it expects up to 3,000 posts to be abolished as a result of Stoke-on-Trent Council’s “savage” budget reduction. The union said it had already begun campaigning against the region's "devastating" cuts.

As reported yesterday by Insider, Stoke’s Council said it expects to shed up to 700 jobs over the next year as the budget cuts come into action. However, trade union GMB said over the next four years, between 2,500 and 3,000 jobs could be lost as the council battles to find £100m of savings.

GMB said it was “currently dealing” with an advance statutory notice of redundancy from Stoke-on-Trent for 713 jobs to be cut before 30 April 2011.

The government has announced a cut in the council's grant of about 28 per cent. Savings could be made by axing the council’s non-teaching workforce of 9,200 employees, said GMB.

Colin Griffiths, GMB regional organiser, said that cuts of this magnitude would be “devastating” for services, jobs and the economy in Stoke-on-Trent.

Warwickshire County Council said it had also had to announce its “biggest spending challenge to date”, after being told that it would face a 26 per cent budget cut over the next four years.

Although the exact details of Warwickshire’s settlement will not be known until early December, the county council said it was preparing to make “unprecedented savings” of up to £60m by 2014.

The council predicted a “worst case scenario” of up to 1,855 jobs that could be at risk over the next three years, although it is hoped that the number of staff affected will be far lower.

The council said it would “do all it can to avoid compulsory redundancies through a range of measures such as natural turnover and leaving vacant posts unfilled”.

The savings at Warwickshire will come in a variety of ways, said the council. A total of £17m will be cut by having “a leaner organisation with fewer management and support services”, while another £20m will be saved by sharing services and buildings.

A further £16m will be rescued through “the tough choices of stopping some services completely”.

Councillor Alan Farnell, leader of Warwickshire Council, said: "The pace and magnitude of the financial challenge requires large scale reform. We are well placed to do this. Over the last four years the council has been undergoing a transformation programme to do things differently, more efficiently and to deliver better outcomes for residents. We have put into place a leaner management structure through reducing senior roles over the last few years by a third.

“We will be tough but fair. Our aim is to protect the most vulnerable and the services that support them. We want to keep people safe, foster independence and to support enterprise but we also need to achieve value for money.”

In Stoke-on-Trent, GMB officers said that they feared the region’s private sector “does not have the capacity to generate enough new jobs to make up for job losses on this scale”.

Griffiths said: “People in Stoke-on-Trent face cuts in the care services for the vulnerable, in the youth service, in museums, galleries and libraries, and in services all across the council.

“The impact on the vulnerable and how this impacts at a human level has not been factored in by the Tory-Liberal authors of these cuts. GMB will be seeking contact with community groups and users to look to mitigate the worst aspects of these cuts."