• About 1,500 jobs are to go at Liverpool city council because of government spending cuts, according to the BBC. The Labour-run council needs to reduce staff numbers by the end of March 2013 - and said compulsory redundancies would be necessary.

• The Independent today reports on the woes of care home provider Southern Cross, whose share price has dropped from 538p when floated in 2006 to just over 23p yesterday. Around 37,000 of the UK's 400,000 care home residents are housed by Southern Cross, Britain's largest nursing home company. The company's chief executive told the Indie:

"In the short term, despite our many efforts, we will still have to battle pretty hard against headwinds, including local authority cutbacks."

• Birmingham Citizens Advice Bureau is expected to shut down all five of its advice centres after the city council decided to withdraw all its funding, worth £600,000 a year, according to Third Sector. The CAB, the largest in the country, said it would have to close all of its advice centres on 11 February with the loss of 45 jobs, unless replacement funding could be found.

On my radar ...

• Bins. Localism? It's all about refuse collection, reckons Eric Pickles. In his 22-minute address to yesterday's New Local Government Network annual meeting, the communities secretary spent 8 minutes talking about bin collections. (thanks to Polly Curtis on the stopwatch). He told delegates:

"We need to remember that rubbish is the most visible and most frontline service of all in return for what they now pay – the best part of £120 a month in council tax.
If we don't sort it out I think the cause of localism will be set back by a generation by creating an army of residents who view their council with resentment rather than respect. There is genuine anger that over the last decade council taxes have doubled and bin collections have halved."

Patrick Butler was at the conference and on his latest Cutsblog post accuses Pickles of trying to create a diversion from the issues of cuts and chaos. And I can't resist but draw attention to HaroldHare's contribution to the debate:

"It's a basic right for every English man and woman to be able to put the remnants of their chicken tikka masala in their bin without having to wait a fortnight for it to be collected."
Eric Pickles' chicken tikka has remnants? I find this hard to believe ...

Coincidentally, Margaret Eaton of the Local Government Association today writes for the Guardian in response to last week's Society cover story, and Pickles' assertion that councils should share the blame for the UK's budget deficit with the big banks:

"Comments that put hard-working council staff, many of whom are facing redundancy, in the same bracket as bankers trivialise the fact that local authorities are facing the toughest financial settlement in living memory. What we need is a serious, grown-up debate with the government about how that reduction can be managed in a way that protects vital frontline services."

And on the subject of Pickles, the Primly Stable blog recounts the battle to get the CLG to own up to perpetuating the "Winterval myth". Having got the brush off from the department after writing last year, an FoI request was submitted asking for the research data on which Pickles' comments (reported widely) were based. And the result of that request? The reply: "This department does not carry out research on this matter, and whether and how to celebrate the festive season is a decision for individual local authorities. Mr Pickles was making the point that councils should continue to take pride in Britain's Christian heritage and traditions ..." The blog concludes:

"... don't expect Pickles to get in hot water over his department's lies and smears any time soon - as I said before, his rentaquote "common sense" approach chimes perfectly with the agenda of the Mail, Sun, Telegraph et al, so the mainstream media aren't exactly queuing up to point out his shortcomings."

• A complaint to the Press Complaints Commission by the Broken of Britain team, following yesterday's Daily Mail story on the DWP's latest latest figures on employment and support allowance applications. Compare and contrast the Mail's version with these figures from the Institute for Social and Economic Research.

Meanwhile, charity coalition the Papworth Trust has warned that reforms to the work capability assessment, which examines people's fitness for employment, "will cause further misery to Britain's most vulnerable people". The trust says:

"Charities are being overwhelmed by evidence showing the assessment to be inaccurate. The government's independent review of the assessment, published in November 2010, made recommendations for improvements which were widely commended by industry experts. However the government now plans to firstly implement recommendations from their October 2009 internal review, which charities believe will worsen the assessment."

• This great post from the Flip Chart Fairy Tales blog, which asks Why are public sector efficiency savings so hard? and warns against trying to impose techniques from the manufacturing sector on the public sector.

• A cheer for backroom staff - especially the accountants - from the We Love Local Government blog:

"In the past few weeks I have had lots of dealing with accountants and every time they have shown imagination, skill, mental dexterity and a deep understanding of how our council's budget works. Without them I, and I dare say the rest of my council, would be lost."

• Tweet of the day from the New Statesman's Samira Shackle:

"If Britain looked like its government: 4m would have gone to Eton, there would be no black people, & for every woman there would be 6 men."

• This new survey by the EIRIS Foundation and the Holly Hill Charitable Trust, which has found evidence of growing pressure on charities to invest ethically. What is the UK public's opinion of charitable investments found that 78% of the UK public would think worse of a charity if they found out it had funds invested in activities that run contrary to its specific work and values.

• This sad story from Society contributor Kate Murray on the Social Issue blog, All in a good cause? Charity cold callers target the vulnerable. Murray recounts how her mother, who has multiple dementia, was persuaded by a fundraiser to make a charity bequest. The charity in question moved swifty to rectify this when it was pointed out to them but it's by no means an isolated incident:

"When I started to have a dig, I soon soon found my mum's experience was not unique. Take a look at the Alzheimers Society chat forum, for example, and you'll see pages of discussion about dementia sufferers being cold-called, with, in one case, a fundraiser for a reputable charity apparently going round door to door in a sheltered housing scheme and even filling in the direct debit form when the potential donor was unable to do so."

On the Guardian Professional Networks

• Live Q&A from 1pm today: How to raise the profile of your social enterprise.

• 'Much that is good gets thrown on the tip,' says a charity worker frustrated by the end to government funding.

NHS Employers, representing trusts in England, is pushing a two-year freeze on both pay and normal annual increments, despite opposition from all the major unions, reports the Healthcare Network.

Events

Public Services Summit New models, new relationships, a new era. 10 & 11 February, St Albans.

Join leading thinkers, practitioners and policy makers for discussion and debate about the future of our public services.

Mobile and Wireless Healthcare Enabling access to care at the point of need. 16 February, Birmingham.

This conference is aimed at ICT and service delivery teams in the NHS to give them practical advice and guidance at a time where all we can be certain of is a reduction in public sector budgets. 2 for 1 delegate place offer available.

Public Sector Procurement 17 February, Manchester. Only £99 to attend.

A one-day conference for public sector buyers and suppliers, exploring new policy and innovation from across the north of England.

Managing Public Sector Information 2011 Making the transparency agenda happen. 1 March, London.

An essential forum for professionals involved in managing, storing, use and governance of information in the public sector, when the push is for increased openness and transparency. Save 20% when booking before 31 January.