Public services, the UK economy and the Brexit debate
Social investment has become a social policy concept that can be seen as a way to find a new economic legitimacy to social programmes. This has been as means of increasing economic productivity; it plays a positive role in economic regulation and investment in human capital (training and education) and social programmes like universal access to childcare and early childhood education, viewed as good for the economy. Interrogating ‘cuts to services’ as socially and politically contentious places the notion of ‘de-professionalisation’ at the heart of assessing the impact of the commercial model within the NHS, social care, education and criminal justice domains of the public sector. How have these cuts helped to downsize professional service-inputs in the form of efficiencies, pay cuts, rationing, reducing training and staff development, all of which potentially affect overall economic productivity? Will Brexit impact on the role and status of professionals living in the UK?