Thread by @pmdfoster

🧨🧨 NEW. Leaked Treasury memo concedes Boris Johnson’s plan to cut civil service risks ‘adverse impacts’ on frontline services - my latest with ⁦@eirnolsoe⁩ @FT /1
on.ft.com/3xEpuu0

So @BorisJohnson said this week the decision to “prune back” Whitehall departments could be achieved “without harming the public services they deliver” — but no-one agrees with that. Not insiders or experts. /2

Because cutting one fifth of Civil Servants in three years when HALF deliver frontline services (prison officers, probation, court staff, govt agencies like DVLA etc) can’t be done without impact /3

Here’s how HMT puts it. “As far as possible, departments should aim to mitigate any adverse impacts on the delivery of public services and wider government priorities. However, it is recognised that in some instances departments will need to consider reprioritisation.”/4

So while — as one senior civil servant tells me — “the government of the day has a perfect right to shrink the state to the size it sees fit, but it can’t escape the consequences of doing that” /5

Because this isn’t about “pruning”
Whitehall, it cuts across swathes of public sector output.

As @RhysClyne of @instituteforgov says these 20% cuts are near equivalent to austerity years cuts but in half the time. See chart. /6

As @SirBobKerslake tells my colleague @eirnolsoe this will have lasting and real impacts/ 7

So for example we know that 2014 cuts to probation service lead to documented increase in reoffending, offend violent. And cuts in prison staff mean more violence and suicides etc. /8

The madness is that Govt wants to go back to 2016 levels of staff — which was a historic low ebb — just as demand is rising from cost of living crisis,
Govt policies and #brexit transition /9

DIT needs more officials to negotiate those world-leading trade deals.

Home office needs more people to run it’s world beating border.

So does HMRC dealing with #brexit customs.

20k new police officers mean 6 new prisons. More staff there too. /10

But there is @BorisJohnson and @Jacob_Rees_Mogg saying you can do all this while slashing head count by 20%. Oh. And “computers”, obviously. /11

But as ever they seem incapable of levelling with public.

This policy gets them a day’s good headlines in the Daily Mail.

But when govt depts start spelling out what will need to be chopped to make these cuts, they’ll be in a world of pain.

It’s government by spasm. ENDS