Redundancy

Press, 2 June 1989, Page 8

Redundancy

Sir,—When will we have a clearly defined policy from either political party to reduce the unemployment figures? Redundancy payments are taken as justification of employers’ actions, but these agreements were made in times of full employment when laying off staff was a cause of national outcry and not in recent years when redundancy has the prevalence of the common cold. Even in those socalled badly managed times employers still engaged staff despite these agreements, so little credence can be given to them as being the cause of the present problems. Current problems are caused by the greed of the profit before all else; employers now with the ability to shed staff at will creating a one-off cost to the company and a long-term cost to the taxpayer. The Government certainly never takes any company to task over its labourshedding policies because it is a direct result of its own freemarket policy. It also facilitates its own acts of staff reduction, previously unacceptable, but now

palatable as it is the established norm in the private sector. There will not be an adequate answer to this problem until the company is required to bear not only the one-off cost but also the continuing cost of dole payments currently funded by the average taxpayer.—Yours, etc.,

G. D. STAIRMAND. May 30, 1989.