Maude nods to backdoor privatisation for mutuals

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has indicated that the 'mutualisation' being imposed on the public sector could lead to full privatisation.

 

In an interview with Civil Service World – a newspaper aimed largely at civil service managers – Mr Maude says the chosen private sector 'partner' for My Civil Service Pension could eventually buy out the organisation.

MyCSP – the government agency that administers the pensions of 1.5 million serving and retired civil servants – is the first civil service body in line to be turned into a so called 'mutual joint venture', part owned by a private company.

On the shortlist of preferred partners is Capita, the multimillion pound outsourcing firm run by Paul Pindar, who is paid as much in a week as some PCS members who work for him are paid for a whole year.

Staff have said all along that they do not want to go down this route, and have already taken strike action against the proposals. In a survey of staff conducted by the union, almost 95% said they did not agree with Mr Maude that turning MyCSP into a mutual would "empower employees and drive up performance".

In the interview, the minister is quoted as saying: "You wouldn’t want the staff to be excluded from the ability to benefit from the sale of the entity. In the mutuals which are for-profit, rather than not-for-profit, you want people to feel that there’s a possibility at the end of it that they may be able to cash out, which is fine."

We have always said that organisations that are truly employee-owned and run have a worthwhile place in our economy, particularly as a counter to the profit-driven model that all too often means low pay and poor terms and conditions for workers.

But the plan for MyCSP is the polar opposite of this. The first act of mutualising the organisation will be to strip the staff of their civil service status, leaving them vulnerable to attacks on their terms and conditions.

If after a few years the private company fully takes over an organisation like MyCSP, the result will be the same as if the service had just been privatised outright in the first place.