MDR
Did you get my email?
Hugh, I wouldn't get too hung up on the link between unpaid leave and reduced services. The govt is already going down the road of not replacing staff, and shrinking staff numbers by 27,000. That's 6.3m fewer days worked in the system, so the concern about reduced services is largely a phantom on my view. If people cared about that, they'd object to the reduction in numbers.
In the civil service there is already a facility for up 18 days off on flexi, which is widely abused as people come in early when they're not needed, clock in during lunch time or stay late with nothing to do, just to build up time. Adding unpaid leave to that was never a runner in my view. The unions were given a mandate to prevent pay cuts. Instead they went in and negotiated a pay cut in return for extra time off that noone had asked for.
For the most part people calling for public service reform know nothing about public services. They think that it will be possible to avoid wider tax increases (for themselves) by reducing the cost of the public service through reforms. In reality the Government's 'reforms' have added layers of bureaucracy to the system (hello risk registers, PMDS, strategy statements, annual output statements) even though public servants pointed out up front that they were a waste of time. Don't even start me on decentralisation.
This debate was never about reforming the public service or equalising public and private sector pay. The Govt wants the money and are more certain of getting it by pay cuts that by tax changes, where the return is uncertain. The whole hoo-ha about public Vs private was just an exercise in preparing the ground for the cut.
In the civil service there is already a facility for up 18 days off on flexi, which is widely abused as people come in early when they're not needed, clock in during lunch time or stay late with nothing to do, just to build up time. Adding unpaid leave to that was never a runner in my view. The unions were given a mandate to prevent pay cuts. Instead they went in and negotiated a pay cut in return for extra time off that noone had asked for.
For the most part people calling for public service reform know nothing about public services. They think that it will be possible to avoid wider tax increases (for themselves) by reducing the cost of the public service through reforms. In reality the Government's 'reforms' have added layers of bureaucracy to the system (hello risk registers, PMDS, strategy statements, annual output statements) even though public servants pointed out up front that they were a waste of time. Don't even start me on decentralisation.
This debate was never about reforming the public service or equalising public and private sector pay. The Govt wants the money and are more certain of getting it by pay cuts that by tax changes, where the return is uncertain. The whole hoo-ha about public Vs private was just an exercise in preparing the ground for the cut.