What, if anything, would public sector mass walk-outs acheive?

[Chil1234]

That's it really. IMHO, very little bar a reduction in public sympathy and even worse public services for those who use and/or need them.

I totally agree pointylug. These companies see a public sector body and think money bags - I reckon they add on a good margin. One of the beauties of working in a specialist team is that procurement haven't got around to interfering, so we get to choose our own suppliers for stuff we need that's out of the ordinary. As ever though there's a flip side. We all know that cheapest is not always best, quite the opposite, yet we come under huge pressure to choose the cheapest tender for goods/services even though we know they will deliver crap. A total false economy that ends up costing loads more in staff time supervising to the nth degree and rectifying mistakes.

The public sector has it wrong on so many levels that are totally out of the control of most of the staff.

No sorry, strike that. It does not cost loads more in staff time because we end up picking up the pieces for free in our unpaid overtime.

If some bright spark sorted out that mess, there'd be a tidy saving.

It's such a ham-fisted approach to just say, right, what services will we cut.

I am resigned to it being beyond the IQ of most public sector senior managers to sort out. They don't want to address obvious things like this because it is more complicated than slashing budgets and freezing posts. Most senior managers have such a poor grasp of the financial side of things - hence the stupid end of year spending sprees etc. And it would require sector wide cooperation - ha ha.

Oh yes, I forgot about the end of financial year Big Spend. SHocking waste of money.

But to emphasise once again, this is not the fault of the vast majority of public sector staff. We have to work within the rules we have. We all know the rules are total shite, which is why so many of us are utterly utterly peed off. Especially when joe public doesn't care that so many public sector staff are having pay cuts and losing their jobs in the shadow of such blatant inefficiencies.

it's not just about how workers are treated though is it? it's about and ideology.

i believe that everybody deserves a decent education, healthcare and other services regardless of how wealthy they are.

i provide one of those services/opportunities and i provide it equally to everybody regarless of ability to pay. if i went to the private sector then i would be providing it for wealthy people who arguably need what i provide less while poorer people would go without. that's not why i went into this field of work.

and i'm sorry if some people think that we 'can't afford' to have principles or ethics anymore... i personally think that a society should be judged on how we treat our weakest members.

Well yes, precisely. In my particular sector it is possible to work for a private company, often for a lot more money, but to do so is to leave all professional ethics at the door. That is something I am not prepared to do, and neither are my colleagues.