Andy,

Diversity officers are roles that are few and far between - they are roles that help the less advantaged in society - for example the physically disabled and those with learning difficulties - to get the same access to council services as the rest of us - I think that's a good thing, don't you?

Granted, there are a few people who get a bit hysterical at the idea of such officers helping people with different skin colours, but that's simply because they are bigots isn't it?

As for PR and marketing officers - again, there are very few such roles, and they will be in place to ensure that as wide a range as possble of the public will be aware of council services, and to ensure for example that private and public sector co-operation, e.g. corporate sponsorship for council events is arranged as effectively as possible.

The vast majority of public sector employees are a) relatively low paid and b) in useful and necessary jobs which we all take for granted.

I'm not a public sector worker, but I was once, and I'm sick and tired of reading ill-informed rubbish from people about public sector jobs, pay and pensions, often from people who ought to know better, such as local councillors.

If these people really think that public service is such a soft touch, why aren't they applying for jobs?

Even if we got rid of all of the roles you regard as 'non-jobs', they are so small in number that we would still be facing cuts to front line public services.

The very wealthy in this country were the cause of the current debt levels and it is they, rather than the public services we all need that should bear the burden of that debt. Instead, the current government are protecting them at the expense of the rest of us.

Consider this - 95% of this country's wealth is in the hands of just 5% of the population. Do you really think we will clear our debts simply by constantly hitting the 95% of people (including you and I) who own just 5% of our wealth?

Peter ...

"

As for PR and marketing officers – again, there are very few such roles"

Yup, Shropshire Council "only" has 10 of these positions!

Andy,

I'm afraid I've never heard of the communist workers party.

I'm not a member of Unison, not am I a member of any political party.

Why are you so keen to protect the very wealthy? Are you happy that they pay so little in tax in proportion to their income?

Spencer,

Our debt, at the point of handover was some 62% of GDP. To put that into perspective, back in the late '50s early '60s, when Harold Macmillan told the country 'You've never had it so good' debt was 100% of GDP.

As previously stated, Japan's debt before the earthquake was 200% of GDP.

Moving back to our own debt - of the 62% of GDP, almost half (30% of GDP) was caused directly by the bailout of the banks. With a properly-structured debt recovery programme, we ought to be able to get all of that money back - but the government seem reluctant to offer any schedule for such repayments - possibly because the Tory party are largely funded by the big banks.

If we take the net (32% of GDP) figure as our true level of debt, that isn't a particularly high figure. To put it into some context, even at the height of the cuts in the '80s, that figure only went down to about 25% of GDP, and the price that ordinary people paid for that was rampant inflation and high unemployment.

So all in all, this is not an historically high level of debt in real terms.

Turning to the money paid out to bail out the banks, it came from public funds (and borrowing) to which the taxpayer, including all of those in public sector jobs who pay their taxes, contribute. We need to get the money back from the banks - instead we are taking it out on our public services - as if somehow they were to blame.

Ironically those who pay the least proportionally-speaking in tax in our society are also by far the wealthiest. If we have to get the money back from the taxpayer, why aren't we taking it back from that group of tapayers?

It's estimated that up to £120bn per annum goes avoided in tax in the UK - surely if we set about collecting that it would be a good start?

@spencer - just because someone doesn't agree, it doesn't mean they are in the pockets of the unions or some imaginary political party.

I agree with Peter - the banks have been incompetent and greedy, and this government is seizing on the excuse to convince the low to medium income majority that they must be punished for it.

It amazes and disgusts me how many are tugging their forelocks and demanding to be spanked harder instead of seeing through the con. Even worse is the way relatively low paid people are turning on each other - bash him now! take her pension away!

My son is working in the US. Pretty decent job - but he can be 'let go' with not a day's notice and no redundancy or compensation. Yet the Americans accept their lack of workers' rights and still despise unions. We're trudging down the same road :(

That is the problem Kathy if an employer needs to let a person go why should they have to pay any form of compensation or redundancy other than the final months pay? they gave the person a job and paid them to do it along with holidays etc for however long they were there. I worked at a local education establishment for a while and when they let managers ,lecturers go they were paid 6 months pay plus redundancies of a week and a half for every year there up to a max, who is paying for these obscene over generous handouts??, support staff were offered week and 1/2 for every year there, no extra for them.

"why do people stay in these low paid jobs for so long?"

You should be grateful they do, you and everyone else would be up the creek without them. And unskilled or low-skilled jobs still need to be done - or would you like to import a few boatloads of Chinese peasants to do them?

Andrew,

Public sector pensions are typically accrued on a 1/80th per annum basis, up to a maximum of 40/80ths of final salary. So, if you work a full 40 years, your pension is worth 50% of your final salary, if you work 20 years, it's 25% and if you work 10 years it's 12.5% - payable typically at age 60.

As with everyone else, public servants don't get their state pension until 65, 66, 68 etc. dependent upon age.

Obviously, relatively few public sector workers do the full 40 years, so many pensions are far less than the final salary they relate to. The figure of an average of £7k per annum is indisputable - it was confirmed in Lord Hutton's report.

The average public sector wage is more or less in line with the average national wage at present.

If you take a subset of the average national wage based upon that proportion of the population with a similar level of qualification to that required to take on most public sector jobs and compare that subset, then typically the public sector comes out as worse off.

Sorry, that was to Andrewy.

I rather suspect your name is a wee bit inaccurate Mike.

Mike,

If you are searching for truth in the pages of the Torygraph then I fear you're on a life-long hiding to nothing.

I note that in the article the figure of £50bn is mentioned in the context of the cost of a number of items, transport, the NHS etc.

Isn't it odd then that Mr Randall makes no mention of the fact that we allow at least that amount per annum, and possibly more than twice that amount, to simply leak away from our economy by way of tax breaks for the wealthy?

I fully accept we can't pay people to stay at home to do nothing - so why are this government so intent on putting hundres of thousands of public anf private sector workers in precisely that position with these cuts?

Mike Oxlong, would you say that cutting fuel duty is the sort of thing that a government wanting to be known as 'the greenest ever' should do in its first budget?

Surely a genuinely green government would have the courage to turn the economy in a sustainable direction and create jobs in the process.

Wouldn't it be better instead for a green government to pump stimulus money, provided by the bailed out banks, into a radical alternative: a green industrial revolution, which would start cutting our country's fossil fuel habit, revive the manufacturing sector and create jobs in sustainable industries.

In October 2009 South Korea invested 81% of its stimulus package (2% of its GDP) in energy efficiency, solar and wind energy, greener vehicles, green electronics and lighting and other green industries.

This injection of funds has helped South Korea's economy emerge from the financial crisis in a much healthier state than most others across the world.

Isn't this sort of economics what we need to get us out of the mess? Surely the industry with the best chance of creating wealth in the future is green industry.

You used the word 'genocide' for what is going on in Libya. Do you really mean 'genocide'?

Surely if we want to prevent repressive regimes massacring their people, we shouldn't sell them arms.

What do you think of the arms sales to Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Saudia Arabia, Yemen and Bahrain in 2009/2010 (detailed in today's report by the House of Commons' Committee on Arms Export Controls)?

David Cameron's February tour of undemocratic countries in the Middle East with arms manufacturers shows one of the ways that our Prime Minister wants to stimulate the economy.

So is it at all surprising that people marched for an Alternative?

Is there not a more sustainable way of stimulating our economy, maintaining popular public services, creating jobs and wealth and making our common future more secure?