Last Sunday’s tragedy brings home how important it is to protect our public services

That’s not easy for a newspaper columnist. Writing about fiscal deficits, the economy and business matters seems pretty insignificant in the midst of human tragedy, but it’s all I can do (and I can hear my many detractors say that I don’t do that very well, either).

However there may be economic lessons to be learnt even from such tragedies as the recent riots in the UK.

The mayhem on the mainland has persuaded some people that there is a link between increased criminality and moral decline, and the state of the economy. That may or may not be true, but it is undoubtedly the case that an economy that offers fulfilling well-paid jobs is less likely to have social problems. There will always be wrong-doers, but many will be saved from going over the edge because they have a bright future financially and are valued.

It’s not just about money and material possessions, of course. If that were the case you would have to at least have some sympathy for the looters because all they were doing was acquiring the possessions that other people could afford. It’s true they might not actually need the latest version of the Xbox, but multimillionaires don’t need another trophy-winning football club either, so there is greed in all levels of society.

Some might say that it’s greed that makes the world go round, and certainly the acquisition of material wealth and the status that goes with that wealth is a powerful incentive in our society. However, as Jersey’s recent tragedy shows, there are many people who are motivated by more than just money and many of them work in the public service in various capacities. These public servants want to make a contribution to society and help others and so the title public servant is very apt. Of course, they also want a decent wage and to be treated fairly, but the paramedics, medical staff and policemen who worked so hard at the weekend didn’t stop to think about that. They just got on with their job and in many cases did more than their job.

Some of these people may have been attracted to the public service by a generous pension, but it’s hard to deny them that when you appreciate what some of them had to go through at the weekend.

I’m not trying to make a distinction with those who work in the private sector by claiming that they are only motivated by money. Some are and some aren’t. Many of them would also willingly make any sacrifice they could to help others. They are also most certainly the ones that produce the wealth to pay for the public services.

But I think that it is worth emphasising at this financially difficult time how important it is to have a well-motivated, well-resourced public service able to handle such an event as the one that happened on Sunday, even though it was extremely rare.

Not even the most hardened supporter of small government would disagree with that, I’m sure. Their problem is that they apparently think you can provide such services on the cheap.

They say they wouldn’t want to see ‘front line’ services affected by the need to make cuts, and I believe them. However, some of them fail to realise that it’s those services that account for the vast majority of States spending. If we have to save a lot of money – and we do – then it’s bound to have an impact on the ‘front line’.

There may be different ways of working which could save some money. For example, despite the recent riots, the UK government is determined to reduce the number of policemen because they believe they can move officers from back-office activities. Presumably those activities still have to be carried out, but it’s apparently cheaper to bring in non-uniformed people to do it.

The UK with its layers of management and geographic spread has plenty of opportunities to make savings like that, even if it’s going to be difficult and may not achieve the savings expected. But there are far fewer opportunities to make similar savings in a tiny island with one police force with few layers of management or armies of administrators.

Obviously we should try to make the police service more efficient, as we should do with all States departments at all times – not just when the money runs out. But we also shouldn’t exaggerate the savings that can be made by such things as centralising functions, procurement and ‘lean working’. In some cases it has even added to costs, not savings.

The people who are involved in restructuring the States aren’t silly, so they won’t do anything that would obviously damage essential services. However, some critics of the States are silly, and they would happily see dramatic cuts without giving much thought to the implications.

They are the ones who believe that you can maintain essential services while hacking away at the administrators and pen pushers. They measure efficiency by the number of nurses, policemen and teachers and fail to recognise that behind every front line worker, there are pen pushers making sure that they can do their job properly.

Much of the publicity following Sunday’s tragedy will rightly go to those who had to recover and help the victims. But the hospital porters and even the people manning the switchboard had a vital role to play. The pen pushers will also make sure that the frontline staff is paid, looked after, trained and have the equipment they need. So we should be very careful about making distinctions between essential and non-essential public servants.

Certainly last Sunday’s tragedy brings home how important it is to protect those services whose value cannot be measured purely by economic efficiency.

Peter Body is editor of Business Brief magazine