Secret plan to cut 8,000 public jobs was buried
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Friday September 05 2008
RADICAL reforms of the public sector -- including plans for 8,000 job cuts -- have been swept under the carpet.
The reforms were recommended by a secret group of senior civil servants who are now in revolt over the way their proposals were buried.
The group made the recommendation in a series of phone calls to the Paris-based OECD, which was carrying out a major review of the public service.
They were so concerned their plans would be dismissed that they used outside phone lines to contact the high-powered international think-tank.
The OECD last night confirmed it had been contacted anonymously by up to five senior civil servants who had pleaded for radical reforms.
These included the use of early retirement schemes to "weed out" those who were unwilling to work or whose functions had disappeared.
But last night, one member of the rebel group branded the OECD report -- published earlier this year -- as a "total and utter wasted exercise" after it emerged it had been vetted in advance by the country's most senior civil servants.
The group, which has decades of experience in the public sector, called for the numbers to be cut from 33,000 to 25,000 to ensure a more efficient public service. The 33,000-strong civil service includes the staff of the 15 government departments, and of agencies such as the Revenue Commissioners and the Office of Public Works. However, it does not include other public servants such as gardai, nurses and teachers. The OECD has confirmed the draft report, which was commissioned by the Government at a cost of €490,000 to the taxpayer, was shown to civil servants at a private meeting in Dublin on December 7 last year.
At the meeting, they raised concerns about the tone of the language and claimed some parts of the report might be "misconstrued" by the media.
And when it was published last April, it contained no mention of the secret call by the group members for radical action to tackle the "vast overstaffing" in the civil service.
The revelation will increase pressure on Taoiseach Brian Cowen to deliver the "change" in the civil service he has repeatedly promised.
He has already set up a task force to implement the OECD report, but civil servants outnumber private-sector members on it by five to four.
OECD review co-ordinator Edwin Lau told the Irish Independent: "The common theme from them [the group] was that 'we are not free enough to do our jobs the way we would like to. Our hands are too tied and that is de-motivating'. That message did come through in a number of comments."
The group members spoke to the OECD on condition of anonymity because they said a public approach would be "career suicide".
One member of the secret civil service group last night told the Irish Independent: "There is a not a department that is not currently over-staffed. It's soul-destroying."
However, the OECD decided to reject the call to "weed out" civil servants. "While the Irish public service is a bit younger than other public services, in 10 years it's going to be more in line with the rest of Europe. So Ireland would be repeating the mistakes other countries made going back 15 years, where they were doing early retirements and now they're having a shortage of people," Mr Lau said.
The secret group of senior civil servants meet regularly on an informal basis. Although they were frustrated by the content of the OECD report, they are now pinning their hopes on Finance Minister Brian Lenihan to implement the radical reforms.
- Michael Brennan Political Correspondent
