Global Social Work: The Evils of Austerity

We don't call domestic economic policies of the Canadian government or the BC government "austerity measures." However many of us who have been working on the front lines, and elsewhere, cannot mistake the sharp right turn and the wholesale gutting of the social safety net that has been happening for our most vulnerable citizens. 

Social workers have seen dramatic job losses in BC in the last decade, or so. Hundreds of SW jobs have been slashed in the BC government. There have also been job cuts in the Health Authorities as well. The impacts are felt by those left behind and those who replace those who get burned out and so on. 

In spite of our struggles within Canada, things are so much worse elsewhere. So called austerity measures are being carried out across many nations. These are nothing but state cuts which are targeted to impact services and supports for the poor and middle class, the young and old, the have nots in society.  

Domestic and global socio-economic systems are in a state of decay, being propped up by "solutions" that continue to transfer the wealth of the people into the hands of the corporations. This is happening right under our noses all around the globe.

Here in Canada, the federal government has announced the new role of the private sector in providing services to people, which includes slashing millions from government funded public services. 

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How are Portugal's cuts affecting social workers?

Rory Truell, secretary-general of the International Federation of Social Workers, is visiting social workers in countries imposing austerity measures. He reports on a visit to Portugal where he met six social workers based at a cancer hospital in Porto.

Rory Truell, Guardian Professional, Monday 19 November 2012.

Ana's job involves ensuring that people who leave hospital after surgery or treatment have the support needed to recover at home or in another non-hospital setting.

"Some of the patients who have had major surgery need a lot of support and sometimes they are also depressed after losing a breast or some other part of the body" she says.
Ana's job has become significantly more difficult. There was a time before the austerity cuts when she could refer patients to specialised community-based units but cuts have significantly reduced such options or made them unaffordable for many people.

"We now have to try to get charities or family or friends to look after discharged patients, which is not easy as most people that live in cities are working and can't be at home to help," says Ana. She adds that it takes a lot more unpaid hours to find solutions of her clients.

To Ana and her colleagues, the economic direction of their country has very worrying long-term consequences. Unemployment has increased from 9.6% before the crisis to 15.7% in 2012. Youth unemployment is 32.6 %, seriously affecting the confidence of the next generation. Portuguese citizens have not only had their wages cut and taxes increased, but they are also enduring a rise in the cost of living from 1.4% a year in 2010 to 3.6% in 2011. All this has pushed the poverty rate in Portugal to 24.4% and it is still climbing as the prime minister is proposing to cut employers' social security contributions with the likelihood of further cuts in benefits.

Young people with degrees are fleeing the country, leaving permanent skills gaps that will undermine any future recovery. It is difficult to imagine the likely scale of the change by the end of the austerity process – and that is without taking account of the very real prospect of being expelled from the Eurozone, which would thoroughly devalue all the country's assets and those of every citizen.

Social workers and citizens of Portugal are not alone in seeing the damaging effects of the austerity measures. Many economists and analysts have pointed out that austerity is having the reverse effect of what was intended as debt is in fact escalating. Director of international labor studies in the UN's International Labor Organisation, Raymond Torres, commented that "the austerity and regulation strategy was expected to lead to more growth, which is not happening. The strategy of austerity actually has been counterproductive from the point of view of its very objective of supporting confidence and supporting the reduction of budget deficits."

Furthermore, the austerity measures mostly affect poor people and those in need of state services, not those who created the problems. The large EU bail-outs reported in the media will have no positive impact on the vulnerable since the money goes straight into the pockets of the investors. Ana tells me that hospitals now have to charge patients and she is worried this will stop people coming in for early diagnosis and treatment. This again is a measure that will ultimately inflate costs as preventative and early treatments are often far cheaper than managing more advanced stages of illness, let alone the human effects on the patients and families of not treating illness early.

There are many alternatives to austerity that can manage debt responsibly without risking economic security and wellbeing. As social workers, we have a natural interest in seeing regulation of world economies to ensure that the poor and marginalised are not repeatedly paying the price for others' greed. Entrusting our long-term wellbeing to unregulated free markets is not a good option. As the leader of the social work team Esperança says to me, "we can't trust the state, we took it for granted that we would have our basic services and receive our pensions, but now we can take nothing for granted."

These social workers in Porto however are not defeated and they are just six of the thousands of social workers in Portugal finding solutions every day.

"We have in part had to return to the old days when people looked after the neighbours and people in communities supported each other," says one of the team. "As social workers we find the resources, we don't abandon people. It is just a shame the government doesn't see our work as being a part of the answer, instead they unfortunately cut our services – the services that are keeping people's heads above water."

The Portuguese Association of Professional Social Workers and the International Federation of Social Workers are calling on the EU to bring in new measures for debt reduction and to introduce regulatory systems that stabilise the impact of economies on the wellbeing of peoples. As can be seen by the experience of Ana and her colleagues throughout Portugal, social workers have performed and continue to play a vital role in finding creative and responsible answers to these huge social and economic problems. By continuing to provide social work services against all odds, social workers become part of the solution and not the problem.

Rory Truell is secretary general of the International Federation of Social Workers