by David Philpott chairman of the Kent branch Institute of Directors

It is customary in some circles to bash the public sector - or more to the point, bash public service employees. Forget Star Wars, this is Sector Wars.

"Fat pensions," "cushy numbers," "jobs for the boys" are all phrases scattered at random like confetti at a big fat gypsy wedding. But there is a change happening. Council cuts are beginning to bite and with them our perception of the public sector is changing.

We had been warned about it, of course but we did not think it would affect us. We have been too busy doing real work - or so we thought. "We directors are the entrepreneurs of the economy without whom there would be no taxes to fund the public sector," we had smugly assured ourselves.

But now we are losing things that we once took for granted and our society is becoming all the poorer as a consequence.

In my own case, it was not the loss of a library or the withdrawal of vital care for an elderly relative that brought this home to me but something a lot more innocuous. I recently wanted to do a spot of rambling and typed the words "Walks in Kent" into my search engine.

In all the years I have been Googling like this, I have never been disappointed - whole afternoons whiled away in the Kentish countryside with quaint undiscovered inns often stumbled upon in the process. On this particular occasion, we set out for the village of Bean near Bluewater for a gentle two-mile hike in the Beacon Wood Country Park. However ,on arrival, we found that this hitherto un-tasted pleasure had already been taken from us. Kent County Council, you see, had chained-up the gates and posted notices to say that, unable to afford its upkeep in the current economic circumstances, the park had been handed back to Lafarge, the owners. Over the next two years, we will see all sorts of things taken away from us - things that we took for granted, expected, thought would always be there - simply because as a country we need to start living within our means.

I know a lot of people who work in the public sector and similarly charities who are funded by grants from local councils. The events of the past 12 months have been a real wake-up call for them and with remarkable good grace it seems to me, most are learning to provide services differently. It is easy to talk about efficiency savings but that is a bit simplistic. Difficult decisions are being made, each and every day.

We Brits love to pigeon-hole things, what with our Private, Public and - heaven help us - Third Sector. Whatever may have been the case in the past, the days of jobs for life on Easy Street are over, irrespective of the sector.

Methinks we are all in this together, so let's role up our sleeves and get on with it, without all that childish cross-sector sniping.