Bruce Cotterill: Public sector waste - Public servants must remember who they work for

It’s all in the name they call themselves. Public servants. Their trade union is named the Public Service Association. The ultimate “boss of the bosses” within the complex structure carries the title Public Service Commissioner.

It’s probably not too much of a stretch to suggest that the core purpose of the people who fill these roles is to “serve the public”.

David Farrar: Government to trim 8,700 public servants

Nicola Willis and Paul Goldsmith have announced the following:

• A target to return the ratio of public servants to the population of 1.0%, meaning a target of 55,000 by 2029

• A sinking lid on operating budgets for agencies that will save $2.4 billion with greater use of AI

• A reduction in the number of core department and ministries from 39 (Australia has 16)

David Farrar: A fiscal reality check

The Taxpayer’s Union has found:

Total crown borrowing per household went from around $60k in 2017 to $120k in 2023

Pee Kay: Upholding our treaty obligations - Political disguise for ethnic grift?

Just prior to winning the 2023 election, in an interview with Mike Hosking Chris Luxon said – “It’s all about management and my personal experience is that CEOs get different results with different management using the same amount of money. So, it’s what you do with it – and expectations and clarity, and bringing in all those CEOs before Christmas and saying ‘hang on, here’s the new deal, the deal is you have to deliver, you have to deliver’ … that’s what I’m sick of, absolutely sick of, all the talk and no action.”

The CEO’s he was “absolutely sick of” were the public servants heading government departments.

I’ll let you into a secret Chris. So the bloody hell are we!

Ele Ludemann: PSA takes women back decades

The Public Service Association is shooting itself in the foot with legal action opposing the government’s restrictions on public servants working from home.

One of its arguments is that the move disadvantages women who do the bulk of work caring for children and the elderly and domestic duties.

Ele Ludemann: Dangers of DEI

Good news that DEI appointments in the public service are numbered:

The Taxpayers’ Union is today celebrating a significant policy victory following Public Service Minister Judith Collins’ announcement that she intends to remove diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) requirements from the Public Service Act. Appointments would be made on the basis of merit, not identity, bringing the focus back to competence and capability.

Taxpayers’ Union spokesman James Ross said:

Ele Ludemann: Two questions public servants should ask

Is this the best use of taxpayers’ money?

If we do this will I be able to look any and every taxpayer in the eye and say I haven’t wasted a single cent of the tax you pay?

Just think how much better the country and the economy would be if every public servant asked these two questions about everything they plan and do and only did it if the answer was yes.

They certainly wouldn’t be doing this :

David Farrar: We still have more public servants than a year ago

The media and the left have reported on the reductions in public service numbers as some form of brutal year zero policy which would have you think the Government has turned the clock back decades.

Clive Bibby: Public servants and the chop.

I spent 12 years of my career as a pubic servant in the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries Farm Advisory Division during the 1970s.

During that time I was able to take advantage of some very real benefits available because of my association (membership of) with the PSA Union. 

Although my personal political beliefs at the time, when the powerful Boilermakers Union led by a Pommie Communist was holding the Country to ransom suggested I was being somewhat hypocritical as the main breadwinner in a family wanting to build its first home - I swallowed some dead rats and signed up to some very attractive low interest loans. The rest they say is history. 

Lushington D. Brady: Won’t Somebody Please Think of the Troughers?

A Tale of Taxpayer-Funded Woe

Won’t somebody please think of the public servants? It’s not easy, you know, pulling in a paltry hundred grand a year, working flexi time, and gorging yourself stupid in Lambton Quay. (Just like Canberra and Hobart, it’s conspicuous just how many fancy cafes and bars tend to cluster around the workplaces of the taxpayer-funded.)

So, take pity on the poor dears as they’re asked to endure all manner of horrors in the name of cost-cutting.