Howard Barrell
Government plans for the biggest shake-up of the civil service in decades will be unveiled next month when Minister of Public Service and Administration Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi tables new pay and retrenchment packages.
Fraser-Moleketi briefed the Cabinet in Cape Town on Wednesday on personnel audits done by provinces and central government departments. The audits indicate how many civil servants are likely to be retrenched under the new package, which will be much cheaper for the government.
But, in an interview with the Mail & Guardian this week, she declined to divulge the estimate.
The government appears not to be seeking a new national framework agreement on the civil service with trade unions but, instead, a more flexible set of relationships.
The challenge before Fraser-Moleketi and her officials will now be to steer the unions – many of them worried about the effect of the shake-up – into line with her plans.
The new pay and retrenchment policies – which appear not to be open to negotiation – will give the government greater flexibility in hiring and retiring civil servants. The government wants similar flexibility when it comes to developing alternative forms of service delivery – such as the creation of semi-autonomous agencies and outsourcing to private companies.
The new pay structure will scrap automatic rank and leg promotions for civil servants – a big factor in the inexorable rise of personnel costs as a proportion of the national budget. The new pay progression system, based on career paths and driven by incentives, includes rewards for increased responsibilities and competencies. “We aim to develop a new civil service ethic,” Fraser-Moleketi said.
There will also be big changes to the structure of housing and medical aid benefits enjoyed by civil servants which, according to an official document circulated last year, could save the government R1-billion a year.