Jobs loss is body blow for area struggling to survive

Published: 6 May, 2011

• ON Tuesday, staff at the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG), based in Archway, took strike action because they are under threat of losing their 

jobs due to an insane relocation proposal that dates back to the Lyons report of 2004 (a year when there were other jobs in London to redeploy to). 

In pursuing this relocation, the chief executive is prepared to waste more millions in taxpayers’ money rather than stay in the current building, Archway Tower, where there is still five years left on the lease. Logic would dictate that staying in Archway would be more sensible and cheaper than disposing of 177 experienced staff and recruiting 177 inexperienced staff. 

The Office of the Public Guardian deals with the finances of the mentally vulnerable. Its role is to protect the public who have been put under the care of the Court of Protection. 

This means dealing with distressed family members, having to look after close relatives because they have dementia and Parkinson’s disease. It means working with local authorities and solicitors for those who have no close relatives. 

This is not a “backroom” job, this is a frontline service. The call centre set up in Nottingham has problems; there are loads of missed targets and the phones are staffed by agency casuals with little or no experience. 

In Birmingham, the proposed new Axis building, which is where jobs are to be moved to, is not even a lease to be held by the OPG. It will be sub-letting and it is not clear who holds the original lease. 

The other OPG building in Hagley Road, Birmingham, is a sub-let from the tribunals service which runs out in 2014. This means that in 2013 the new OPG will be looking for another building. How many more millions is that going to cost the taxpayer and the mentally vulnerable client? 

Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) believes there has not been a thorough, due diligence investigation into this project. It is for this reason that PCS has asked the Public Accounts Committee to investigate this relocation and how it is that senior civil servants can squander so 

much public money. 

Junction Road has many boarded-up shops. This is already a community struggling to survive in the current economic climate. This will be another loss of jobs in north Islington as a result of this move. 

There has been a 40 per cent increase in applications for lasting power of attorney. This effectively translates as a 40 per cent increase in work. There is no need to relocate out of London; in fact, there is enough work to employ staff in London and Birmingham. So why the rush to sack 177 staff in London and get the OPG to squat in insecure buildings in Birmingham? Just staying in Archway for the next five years would be cheaper. 

We make this appeal to the Ministry of Justice to stop and reconsider because too many innocent people will get hurt. This is not just the staff; it means our clients and the community.     

LOIS AUSTIN
Public and Commercial Services Union 
N19

• NATIONAL cuts, which can be laid directly at the Conservative-Lib Dem government, are hitting Archway sooner than we had thought.

The Office of the Public Guardian, which is responsible for looking after the money of those who cannot do it themselves, is based at the Archway tower. 

A proposed move and “downsizing” of the service will mean the loss of 177 jobs in our community, which will not only affect those made redundant and their families, but also local pubs, shops and restaurants as well as the mental health services in Islington.

Mark Serwotka, Public and Commercial Services Union general secretary, has stated that the relocation is the fastest move in the history of the civil service and one that will cost £22m to the taxpayer. 

But, what of the cost to our community in losing this number of jobs?

Once again, we are seeing ideological cuts to services which benefit those most vulnerable in our society, all 

in the name of deficit reduction.  

BECKY WRIGHT
N19