Britain cuts its deficits kindly, gently

On the assumption that some version of Great Britain’s fiscal austerity program eventually will show up in the United States, I have been studying up on what Prime Minister David Cameron calls “The Big Society.”

Severe budget cuts. Major layoffs of government workers. Reductions in government services to be offset by “community empowerment,” with seed money provided by a Big Society Bank. No more nanny state. Get tough, get involved.

‘Bank holiday’

But just when I was getting excited about the Big Society, along came Cameron to mess it up. On Nov. 23, he announced that next April 29 will be a “bank holiday” throughout the United Kingdom. In England, a bank holiday is what we call a national holiday, meaning most workers get a day off with pay.

Each bank holiday costs the British economy about 6 billion pounds, or $9.36 billion. You just don’t declare a bank holiday willy-nilly, especially when you’re trying to rebuild your economy. It has to be a pretty big deal.

The occasion for the national day of sloughing off next April 29: the wedding of one of Britain’s royal mascots and a woman with whom he has been consorting for six or seven years, depending on which tabloid you believe.

How can you take austerity seriously when you knock off for a celebrity wedding?

Most Britons still take their mascots very seriously, though not seriously enough to actually let them run things. The mascot who is getting married April 29 eventually could become mascot-in-chief, so his wedding is a big deal.

The mascots are supported in grand style — about $56 million worth in 2009-2010. It is a sign of just how serious Britain’s economic problems are that the mascots have agreed to take a 14 percent haircut, though not until 2012-2013. Still, they got off easy compared with the rest of the country. It’s good to be king.

Nearly half a million public-sector employees will lose their jobs over the next four years, a sixth of the total public workforce. Most government departments will see their budget cuts by 19 percent, key exceptions being the National Health Service and foreign aid, which remain untouched, and defense spending, which will be cut 8 percent.

It’s all part of the government’s plan to cut 81 billion pounds (about $126.3 billion) in spending over the next four years to bring the deficit under control. You think the United States has a spending problem? Britain’s 2011 budget is about a fourth of the size of the U.S. budget in an economy that’s about one-seventh the size of ours.

On the other hand, Britain’s parliamentary system allows its government to act far more swiftly than ours. In the United States, the co-chairmen of the president’s Bipartisan Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform have proposed tough measures — but far less tough than those in Britain — to bring U.S. spending under control. Politicians here can’t run away from their ideas fast enough.

Whenever tough spending cuts and tax increases are imposed in the United States, you can be sure that they will come cloaked in raiment like Cameron’s “Big Society.” He’s had trouble explaining it to people, much less getting them to buy into it, but the idea seems to be for the national government to form partnerships with communities, charities and individuals to assume jobs that the state used to do by itself.

“The Big Society is a about huge culture change,” he said in a speech in July, a couple of months after taking over at 10 Downing Street. “Where people, in their everyday lives, in their homes, in their neighborhoods, in their workplace, don’t always turn to officials, local authorities or central government for answers to the problems they face, but instead feel both free and powerful enough to help themselves and their own communities.”

How might this work?

Public good

“Social entrepreneurs” would receive government start-up money for ventures that result in a public good. Philanthropies that deal, for example, with the homeless could get help expanding their efforts. Parents who want to start a school could get grants from the Big Society Bank. The government would pay the salaries of 5,000 community organizers.

Many in Britain, even among Cameron’s fellow Tories, are skeptical that the average Brit will turn off the telly and get involved in community activities. The opposition Labor Party calls the Big Society a “cover for cuts,” and looks forward to riding public disenchantment back to power.

Kevin Horrigan is a columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.