Osborne's budget raises questions over cost of job cuts

The chancellor's budget mainly focused on tax and planning, with little about public spending plans though there was some help for charities. Experts have expressed concern about the cost of cutting the public sector deficit, following the budget speech by the chancellor George Osborne, which emphasised the need for private sector growth. Steve Freer, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy, said that while the budget has focused on encouraging enterprise and economic growth to reduce the deficit, it remains "one of the big unknowns" whether the private sector can generate enough new jobs to counterbalance job cuts in the public sector. Lynne Hardman, managing director of professional services at recruitment consultancy Badenoch & Clark, was similarly sceptical, saying that without a greater focus on employment, she failed to see how this could be a budget for growth, particularly given the impact of public sector cuts being felt across the country. Clive Sparrow, director at chartered accountants Grant Thornton, said the government's strategy is still "pretty risky". There was a lot of emphasis in the budget on smaller and medium-sized private firms delivering growth, Sparrow said, but that ministers do not yet fully understand how to help smaller companies. He also said there are concerns about the frontloading of cuts in the public sector and the cost of public sector job cuts. "Talking to clients in both local and central government, their concern is that so much is being asked early on," he commented. "The reform that is allied with the deficit reduction takes time to deliver. At a very practical level, there are concerns about whether the cost of redundancies are being allowed for. There is a lot more stress-testing to be done on the implementation." According to professor Colin Talbot, professor of public policy and management at Manchester Business School, the budget stuck rigidly to the public spending plans set out in the 2010 spending review. "Budgets are normally about 'getting and spending', but this budget speech was all about the taxation side of the equation and only very little about spending," Talbot said . While there was little new for public sector managers in the chancellor's speech, some charities welcomed his measures. Alex Fox, chief executive of charity NAAPs, the organisation that supports family-based, small-scale help for adults, welcomed proposals in the chancellor's growth review, published alongside the budget and said the removal of regulations "not designed or intended" for small charities was welcome. Fox said existing regulations made it impossible, for instance, for sole traders in social care to prove they have obtained a Criminal Records Bureau check, which had locked out smaller providers from competing to deliver care services. The Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations also welcome the chancellor's measures to encourage more people to make donations, including simplifying the Gift Aid system. The key points outlined in the budget can be found online here . This article is published by Guardian Professional. Join the Guardian Public Leaders Network to receive regular emails on the issues at the top of the professional agenda.