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Vince Cable proposes cuts worth £14 Billion
Posted by Sara Scarlett (@sscrltt)
Tuesday, 15th September 2009
From Liberal Vision.org
Nine specific areas of potential savings are identified as a start to a radical programme of reform. The main proposals are:
> Zero growth overall for public sector pay (saving £2.4 billion a year), a 25 per cent reduction in the total pay bill of staff earning over £100,000 and a salary freeze and end of bonuses for the civil service (saving £200 million a year).
> Tapering the family element of the tax credit – saving £1.35 billion.
> A radical review of public sector pensions with the view to moving to higher employee contributions and later retirement ages. There is currently a £28 billion subsidy to unfunded schemes.
> Scrapping several major IT systems including the ID card scheme (£5 billion over 10 years), Contactpoint (£200 million over 5 years), the NHS IT scheme (£250 million over the next 5 years) and the proposed “super database” (£6 billion).
> Curbing “industrial policy”, including scrapping Regional Development Agencies (£2.3 billion annually) and EGCD subsidies (£100 million annually) and reducing (by at least half) the Train to Gain and Skills Councils budgets (£990 million together a year).
> Reforming the National Health Service, by reducing the centralisation and over-administration – starting by scrapping Strategic Health Authorities (£200 million a year) – by strengthening commissioning and with “supply side reform” – in particular tariff reform could save around £2 billion a year.
> Curbing the centralisation in education, by cutting national strategies and scrapping quangos – saving around £600 million a year.
> Reducing the amount of waste in the defence procurement process, including scrapping the Eurofighter and Tranche 3 (£5 billion over 6 years), the A400M (total cost £22 billion), Nimrod MRA4, the Defence Training Review contract (£13 billion over 25 years) and the Trident submarine successor (£70 billion over 25 years).
> Examining possible future public sector asset sales, including some aspects of the Highways Agency (land value of £80 billion) and intangibles such as spectrum, landing rights and emissions trading.
This is an excellent move by Cable. This document proves that he is the only individual to be trusted with the economy. Darling and Osbourne are simply not in the same league. His plans are detailed and the onus is now on the Tories and Labour to be specific and honest about their plans right before Conference season.
