Half a million public sector jobs are set to be cut by 2015, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development has said.

Today, the CIPD published its Election 2010 briefing on the economy and jobs, which says a 10% reduction of the 5.8 million-strong public sector workforce by 2015 was a “reasonable expectation.” Cuts will fall predominantly in back-office functions such as HR, IT, and property according to the CIPD.

It says no political party had fully addressed the need to cut public spending, and that more realistic numbers of job losses would “dwarf” the figures laid out by parties.

The report says: “It is clear that for all the parties the truly critical decisions on how to cut fiscal deficit, and in particular full detail of where the spending axe will fall, are being deferred to post-election reviews. The likelihood is that the squeeze on spending will be considerably greater than any of the parties is
prepared to admit to this side of 6 May [the General Election day].

“In the absence of this further detail, a 10% reduction in the 5.8 million core public sector workforce seems a reasonable expectation, the likelihood of 500,000 jobs being shed in the next five years dwarfing the figures the parties have been prepared to acknowledge in presenting their manifesto policies.”

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