Around 800 workers have taken voluntary redundancy and 200 vacancies will be deleted. The effect on services to the young, the old and vulnerable will be dramatic. Front line services will be slashed and a whole series of management reviews are taking place which will cut admin staff and central functions in the name of making the council “fit for future”.

While the council have avoided compulsory redundancies, a lot of pressure was brought to bear on workers to take voluntary redundancy. The offer was presented as more or less a special, never to be repeated, offer. This wasn’t a simple exercise in natural wastage, more of a crisis measure to try and manage an impossible position.

But Labour councillors need to be far more than mere managers. They need to stand up and represent the people who elected them. There are some fine examples of Labour councillors refusing to implement cuts and being prepared to take on the Government.  These include the Poplar Rates rebellion in 1921, the Clay Cross councillors in the early 1970’s and the Liverpool and Lambeth struggles against the Tories in the 1980’s.

Without a unified struggle against the cuts involving the whole of the Labour and Trade Union movement the risk is that the Tories will be able to pick off one council after another. Councillors will take the mistaken view that they can’t fight back. The key task for trade unionists and Labour Party members involved in fighting the cuts is to build a mass campaign that confronts the Tories and the Lib Dems.

The next weeks are crucial. If even one Labour Group was prepared to stand up and fight the Tories over the cuts, they would provide an example to all the others. If the Tories send in commissioners and auditors to try and take over the running of the councils, they must be met with all out strike action, backed up by coordinated national action. Ultimately that means preparing the way for a 24 hour general strike in defence of public services.