UK Defence Ministry to cut up to 9,000 jobs

This seems to be an increase on previous announcements -

In full

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/321adede-8b19-11dc-95f7-0000779fd2ac.html?nclick_check=1

 

It's just a shame that Swiss Des won't be one of them.

 

I see it this way: 'Bottler' Brown, as Chancellor, increased 'state jobs' by hundreds of thousands, thus building a 'rotten borough' that would be electorarily safe. This he did despite saying he would reduce the civil service. The one department of government that he can kick with total impunity is Defence. Why? The S of S (PT) is probably going to be away shoring up Liarbour in Scotland and will not object. As the 'Cad' said it is a real shame that 'Swiss' Browne is not one of the 9000.

 

WE must have had a helluva lot of fat in the system for the past 20 years if these cuts aren't going to affect front-line services. What a load of old tosh - of course it will affect front-line services.

 

RSM you have put it in a nutshell. The MOD has an expertise in salami-slicing that puts Italian delicatessens to shame but even they would struggle to deliver these cuts. Whatever happened to "irreducible minimums" and "core capability"? Do the pillars of force development appear to be subject to subsidence?

 

9000 jobs is nearly 15% of the MODs total staff. Even once you lose admin and HR types who are currently seen as expendable by the powers that be, you will lose a lot of project management types and experienced figures. My gut feeling is that they will do an 'early release scheme' where many people will take the pension offer and run, and then resort to redundancies as a last resort - mainly to prevent too much of a manpower blip in the system with lots of 50 somethings and few 30 somethings out there.

 

AH you misunderstand what is meant by the phrase "wont affect frontline services" there wont be any frontline services job cuts. In theory you will have loads of money for vehicle maintenance but as there is no one left to do it then you clearly cant spend all the money..


Therefore you dont NEED all the money therefore they can cut that.....

As you dont NEED all the money you clearly are fully funded and therefore could do with looking for efficiency savings by way of job cuts..

and round we go again.

 

You know I have just scared myself with that logic

because I think thats how it works!

 

Call me an old cynic if you want but within 6 months of the 9,000 staff being given the old heave-ho, the MoD will be hiring a shed-load of "Consultants" at £1,000 a day plus to advise on how to do these jobs.

Makes yer sh1t nip!

 

Quite. In the past I have had to work with ammo IPT's and their lack of knowledge in many areas was appalling - and I'm not getting at them because they get posted in to fill a slot (fnarr ) The head of one IPT stated she had never seen any of the weapon systems she was supposed the be in charge of.

However we are starting to lose our core knowledge and whilst it may not be obvious or of immediate interest to the guys in some sandy sh1thole somewhere (they are hitting the crocodile closest to the canoe which is up Sh1t Creek) this loss of core knowledge is both stupid and dangerous. It critically affects our ability to apply force at anything above Unit level (how long would it take UK to set up a Corps level operation? - answer - for ever, as we have cut the capability).

Such losses also affect our ability to use our technolgical advantages as effective force multipliers - we have just got rid of the people who maintain them at 3rd Line and Base area.

 

Closing the Big House in JHQ will take out about 500!!?

 

But I think the majority of them are LAND TLB assets, not DE&S. Still, just goes to show that the people in power who don't have to ask where the next round or meal is coming from don't have to worry about how they make up the 9,000.

It will be reported in the media as "MOD lose 9,000 backroom staff jobs" or somesuch. Joe Public couldn't give a rats where they're coming from.

 

It would be great if any of the savings thus made were to come back to the Forces as a whole. Chances are Zero!

 

What savings? With "voluntary redundancies" and forced redundancies all requiring a pay off, the "savings" wont even be seen for the next 10 years as this will come out of our budget and not the uncivil services to pay for it.

The only good thing is....................... Oh I can't think of any at the moment, give me a week and I'll come up with something positive, I'm sure I will, possibly, well I might..just.

JJ