Would you take a pay cut to save colleagues' jobs?

That's the dilemma facing Southampton's 4,500 City Council employees. Cleaners, park staff, social workers are all being asked to have 5.5 percent chopped off their monthly pay and working hours. In return the ruling Conservative group say they can reduce the number of redundancies by 400.

The unions call it blackmail. Before today's full council meeting Labour councillors held the photo-opportunity pictured above, pouring 792 coins on to a piece of glass to signify the 792 thousand pounds they say could be saved if the glass ceiling was broken that they claim protects senior managers from cuts.

Conservatives and Liberal Democrats decried this as childish nonsense, saying their opponents' sums didn't add up and calling for a more responsible approach to a difficult situation.

But what should the staff make of it? On the one hand a loss of income in tough times, and possibly pension or benefits that are linked to pay or hours worked as well; on the other hand the chance to save colleagues from the dole queue and keep vital services going.

Certainly many in the private sector have seen this all before. Remember Honda sending all their staff on four months unpaid holiday?

Some would say better to keep a job of any sort in these worrying times.

But others would say stand together, don't be scared. Vital services will be needed more than ever in the economy of the future.

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