Super-Ministry ‘Floating’ Will Raise Restructuring Fears - PSA

‘Any return to major restructuring in the public service sector would be completely counter productive,’ the PSA national secretary Richard Wagstaff said today.

‘The Prime Ministers’ floating of a social welfare super-ministry – no matter how embryonic an idea - will simply send the chill of restructuring fatigue through Work and Income and Child Youth and Family workers who, everyone accepts, have been through the wringer of change again and again,’ he said,

‘We must record our disappointment the idea has been put out this way,’ he said.

‘We have been aware of the periphery discussions around this in various quarters but we have not been approached in any formal way. At the very least it will promote debate on the style and structure of the public service but that is little compensation to our members,’ Wagstaff said.

The PSA has long held concerns over the existing fragmentation in the public service and recently endorsed the ‘whole of government’ approach outlined in the first report of the State Sector Standards Board.

‘We are keen to work with the Government in identifying ways to develop a more coordinated, coherent and capable public service,’ Wagstaff said.

‘Done right that would be to the interest and advantage of all but we are equally clear about the fact we won’t accept any expensive, de-moralising and disruptive restructuring,’ he said.

For more information please call
the PSA national secretary, Richard Wagstaff on 025 277 8131
or the PSA media officer, Colin Williams on 025 575 839

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

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