Is it right to invest in public sector services at this time?
The UK government is coming under more and more pressure to reduce investment in the UK public sector at a time when the budget deficit is rising, with a £20 billion deficit in November alone, and UK national debt is growing. So is it right to invest in public sector services at this time?
There is no doubt that we will see a reduction in public sector investment in the short to medium term, with the growing budget deficit and growing debt pile both major issues, but there are other factors to consider. Under the Labour government, the UK public sector has grown enormously and is now the largest single employer in the UK. A large-scale reduction in investment in the sector would obviously lead to significant job cuts which would put pressure on the UK state benefits system and see a rise in unemployment numbers.
The UK government appears set to maintain public sector investment in the very short term, at least until the next general election, with the unions threatening wide scale strike action if significant job losses are announced. In many ways the government is stuck between "a rock and a hard place" but in the end this ongoing enormous investment in the public sector will have to be reined in, something which will bring its own problems in the future.
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