The confirmation today that 2,000 public sector jobs are to go at Manchester City Council, as part of a planned budget reduction of £110 million, will come as grim reading for the people of that city.

According to the BBC News report:

 “Savings of £39.5m - or 21% - will be made at adult services where some charges will be introduced. The council needs to make £109m of savings over the next financial year, rising to £170m in 2012/13. It said 41% of job losses would be among managers.

Publishing the budget on its website the council revealed that despite the cuts it will "be increasing our budget for looked after children by more than £6m, in recognition of the levels of need that exist in Manchester".

Savings in adult services will be made by asking community groups or partner agencies to take over.

All public toilets will close, except those on Mount Street, and swimming pools at Levenshulme and Miles Platting will shut.

Five smaller libraries will close at Clayton, East City in Openshaw, Rackhouse in Wythenshawe, Barlow Moor in Chorlton and Miles Platting, while youth centres will be taken over by voluntary groups.

Staff at Surestart centres will also lose their posts as the council transfers early years provision to external partners. General waste collection will collected fortnightly rather than weekly and streets will no longer be cleaned overnight. Free parking on Sundays will end and on-street charging will be extended to 12 hours between from 0700 to 1900.”

Unfortunately the best that the council leader “Sir” Richard Leese can come up with is:

 “Putting this budget together has involved the most difficult, and in many ways, most unpalatable process I have been involved in since I was first elected to the council.

"I cannot and will not pretend that the financial position in which we have been placed is anything other than bad news.

"Manchester is the fourth most deprived local authority area in the country but is among the top five hardest hit local authorities.

"But we are doing everything we can to protect and maintain the services which people need."

No fight here then. The Tory led government is relying on councils to do the dirty work for them. All complaints about the cuts are being met from Westminster with “It is down to councils to manage their affairs… cut backroom staff… reorganise… be more efficient…” and so on. However, rather than challenge these lies about how the cuts to services can be avoided, councils are  - in effect – going along with this line by trying to carry out cuts, only “more fairly.” Well, we can see how these “fair” cuts have worked out. They are just as bad as the “unfair” ones!

No Cuts!

Labour councils should not be acting as sub-agents for Cameron and Clegg. They should refuse to carry out any cuts and tell the government that any attempt to force a cuts budget through will be met by resistance from the people.  If these councillors haven’t got the guts for a fight they should stand down at let other come in as Labour councillors to do the job they were elected to do – defend the interests of the working class.