The Renewed Programme for Government: Public Service Reform. November 13, 2009
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Economy, Irish Politics.trackback
Up until now I hadn’t really looked closely at some aspects of the renewed Programme for Government, but I have to say, it makes for illuminating reading. Aspirational. But illuminating. Patchy. But still illuminating.
First up let’s look at the preamble Public Sector Reform.
Public Service Reform
The public sector reform agenda is set out in two reports on Public Sector
transformation; the OECD Review of the Irish Public Service – “Towards an
Integrated Public Service”, April 2008 and the Report of the Task Force on the Public
Service “Transforming Public Services – citizen centred – performance focused”,
November 2008.
The core message of the OECD report was that by working in new ways, the Irish
Public Service has the potential to deliver significantly improved services and
outcomes. The Task Force concludes that better services for the citizen, now more
than ever, require prioritization, efficiency and effectiveness measures, the use of
technology and the effective mobilisation and application of resources across a more
integrated public service.
Specific recommended actions of the Task Force are:
• Achieving improved performance by organisations and individuals.
• Creating flexibility in deployment of people, assets and other resources.
• Identifying the precise transformation agenda in each sector.
• Achieving greater efficiency, effectiveness and economy.
• Promoting a shared identity, ethos and vision by focusing on the joint
achievement of societal goals.
• Developing performance metrics which are meaningful to the citizen.
• Increasing organizational and individual accountability for achieving performance
targets.
• Promoting longer term planning.
• Innovation, shared governance, networks and collaborative working.
• Sharing infrastructure and new technologies
The Government will implement the following specific actions in order to implement
the findings and recommendations of the OECD Report and the Task Force on the
Public Service.
Okay, and now to the meat…
Performance Measurement & Reward
• Create a performance culture based on achieving outcomes rather than compliance
with processes, including a requirement to measure performance year by year and
against international standards.
• Ensure better use of public funds for capital projects by developing an improved
capacity within the civil service for performing ex ante Cost Benefit Analyses
including environmental impact and valuation.
• We will ensure that Value For Money reviews are performed by the C&AG on all
large capital projects in a timely fashion.
• Require that the results of Value for Money Reviews be explicitly factored into
budgetary and resource allocation decisions with an accountability obligation for
exceptional cases where this is not done.
• Thoroughly review the current systems for expenses, to achieve significant
savings, including a comprehensive vouched basis for all expenses and enforcing
the necessity for use of public transport and car pooling.
Sounds good, but how does one measure those outcomes? I’ve seen this in the private sector where grand targets are set and then the means to actually meet them subsequently seems curiously elusive. And this seems to be true not just of Ireland but further afield in terms of public sector ‘reform’.
Performance Related Pay in Public Service
• We will implement an independent review of the current Performance
Management & Development System (PMDS) in the public system with a view to
allowing for a new system of performance related pay in the public sector.
This too sounds good. But taking real world examples, how does one map PRP onto many public sector jobs? Social Welfare Offices? Health Service? The mind boggles. Given that in the private sector it’s rare enough to see clerical or administrative staff getting such pay (except as a sort of camouflage for annual wage increases) what precisely is the rationale?
Integrated Public Sector
• We will remove existing demarcations which prevent certain staff applying for
internal positions.
• We will create an integrated public service workforce where the barriers to
mobility between sections of the public service are removed such that all members
of the public service are eligible to apply for promotions in all areas of the service.
Establish a Senior Public Service open to all sections of the public sector
including local authorities, HSE etc.
• We will make greater use of expert advisory/peer review panels such as the expert
advisory panel on climate change (which reports to the Cabinet Committee on
Climate Change and Energy Security) to enhance the technical and specialist
knowledge available to Government.
• We will appoint a Chief Information Officer (CIO) (see Enterprise & jobs
section).
Well, the demarcations point is a good one. There’s little reason why staff in one area shouldn’t be able to move reasonably easily. In fact I’d go further and suggest that such movement should be encouraged after a certain period. The sclerotic effects on both capability and personality of too long a time embedded in a single role are quite obvious.
I also think it makes good sense to promote centres of excellence within the public sector, and not just for technical and specialist knowledge, although God knows it’s crying out for that, but also for purchasing and tenders. Any of us who’ve worked with it for any length of time will know of examples of excessively highly specified equipment brought in due to external consultants recommendations. Or patchy provision of equipment inappropriate to the needs of those using it.
Hiring & Promotion Criteria
• We will ensure current hiring and promotion criteria are reviewed by an
independent body so they are not defined by established public service criteria and
competences, but extended to include professional and technical qualifications
where relevant to particular roles.
• We will ensure that all promotions within the Public Service are on the basis of
merit, eliminating seniority as a determining factor in any public sector
appointment.
That too sounds like a positive idea or two. Seniority simply shouldn’t be the over-riding factor in appointments. And professional and technical qualifications do have a bearing on the suitability of candidates beyond narrow work definitions.
But… well, I’ll return to that.
Reform of Top Level Appointments Commission
• We will reform the way that the most senior positions in the Civil Service are
filled by reconstituting the Top Level Appointments Committee (TLAC) so that in
future, it will be chaired by a suitable, independent representative from outside the
Civil Service on each occasion that it meets to nominate a candidate for
appointment by a Minister or Government.• The Top Level Appointments Committee should be constituted equally by civil
service members and non-civil service members.
Interesting to see if that works out. I’d have thought the inevitable tug of war between politicians and Civil Service would stymie this. But perhaps not.
Senior Positions
• We will open all senior Public Service appointments to public servants from
Principal Officer or equivalent grade upwards and applicants from the private and
other sectors.
Again, this sounds good. But… given that the cry is for wages to fall in the PS, and given that the conditions of those working within it are about to take a knock you’d wonder whether it’s going to be an attractive place for private sector applicants.
This isn’t just musings on my part. We know from the data available that higher level employees in the private sector are seeing wage increases. Any significant wage cuts in the PS will open up a gap between the two to the detriment of the latter. How this is squared I do not know.
“Cooling Off Period”
• We will extend the provisions of the Code of Conduct for Civil Servants in
relation to the acceptance of outside appointments and of consultancy engagement
following resignation or retirement to all Public Servants in designated posts so asto ensure that they shall not, within twelve months of resigning or retiring from
the service:
(a) accept an offer of appointment from an employer outside the Civil Service
where it is deemed to create a conflict of interest;
(b) accept an engagement in a particular consultancy project, where the nature and
terms of such appointment or engagement could lead to a conflict of interest,
without first obtaining approval from the Outside Appointments Board.
To be honest I think that twelve months is too short. It’s a start, but it’s not enough. And this is an issue that all the talk about interconnectedness seems to have missed, that there are good reasons why one might wish to have a certain distance and level of detachment between state and commerce.
State Agencies
• We will ensure a firm basis for the creation and operation of State Agencies. We
will develop clear guidelines setting out the criteria which should be used when
the possibility of creating a new agency and when the possibility of rationalising
agencies are being considered. As part of the current move to rationalise
agencies, we will ensure that such moves do not unduly affect services for the
most marginalised and vulnerable in society.
• We will implement the provisions of the new Code of Practice for state bodies,
especially regarding the role of audit committees.
Hmmm… unduly affect… such a … nebulous term.
Public Interest Disclosures
• We will legislate to prevent employers in the public and private sector from
retaliating against employees who, in the public interest, disclose misconduct.
Absolutely crucial, albeit I can think of one whistleblowers facility currently available that might require another look…
Meanwhile, given the emphasis on cutting numbers in the PS, what to make of this, also from the PfG (and tellingly cut almost verbatim from the Fianna Fáil Local Election Manifesto earlier this year)?
We will provide places in Local Authorities for participants on the new Work Experience Scheme to ensure that each town, city or county area can benefit from the skills of participants as they gain valuable work experience.
And not only, but also (I see checking that progressive-economy got there before me but it’s worth making the point again):
We will take on 1,000 Third and Fourth level graduates to provide additional capacity and skills across the public service and in Government Departments and provide valuable work experience.
Shurely shome mishtake? No?
On the subject of the apparently ‘aspirational’ nature of the renewed Programme for Government, there was a story in last weekend’s Business Post that may be of interest. It’s not a warmly welcomed periodical in these parishes, granted, but the meat of the story is what’s important.
http://www.sbpost.ie/news/ireland/top-civil-service-jobs-open-to-public-45523.html
Four weeks and a day later, on the specific point about opening “all senior Public Service appointments to public servants from Principal Officer or equivalent grade upwards and applicants from the private and other sectors,” – it’s already happening.
I imagine that there will be plenty of people at fairly senior executive level who have lost their jobs, or taken redundancy/early retirement and would be interested in taking on a position where the tenure will be a lot more secure, the pension will be fantastic, the expenses decent, and the pay not to be sniffed at. If the link below is still valid, the Principle Officer pay scale is €86,168 – €114,366.
http://www.publicjobs.ie/publicjobs/en/civilservice/salary-scaling.do
Okay, so it won’t draw in the Gordon Gekkos of the world with six figure bonuses, but it’s a decent enough salary for somebody who felt a calling for taking on a public service role, or whose nest egg wasn’t sufficiently large to keep the wolf from the door and needed to keep paying the bills.
On the broader point of the ‘aspirational’ nature of this Programme, I simply don’t take Pat Rabbite’s read on this. So he’s a cynic, and a grump and it’s in his interest to ‘do down’ anything that the Green Party achieve. That I get. But I had not idea the Labour narrative would have so much traction in the media, and among other commentators. On some issues, the media are taking as gospel anything that emerges from the direction of Gilmore, Burton or Rabbitte.
Exactly the same criticisms were levelled at the time the original programme for government was agreed in 2007. ‘It was full of aspirations’.'There were no timelines’. ‘It was vague’. So I think it is worth relinking to a document we compiled and distributed at the Green members meeting which voted on the new programme a month ago.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/20878459/PFG-Achievements
There’s no empirical way to measure it, but, at a guess, just over two years later about 60% of the stuff we identified as ‘key green priorities’ in that programme have been delivered. Another 30% are in progress, and 10% we won’t get to do – mainly because the public finances have so radically changed.
There’s nothing aspirational, vague or wooly about that.
Be cynical about the content of the programme if you please, but decrying is as aspirational is dishonest in light of the evidence of how the 2007 programme has been delivered.
For the Greens, the implementation and communication of the new Progamme for Government is a critical political priority. You can expect to hear us banging on about it, and ticking it off week by week over the next two and a half years.
To be fare, we tried to do this with the other programme, but whenever we have talked about how we are delivering on renewable energy, or insulation, or creating new jobs, or planning reform over the last 12 months, there has been a wall of indifference. It’s all about ‘propping up FF.’
The vagaries of political commentary, eh?
But taking real world examples, how does one map PRP onto many public sector jobs? Social Welfare Offices? Health Service?
This point is often made, and I think it hinges on a misunderstanding that there must be an exact mapping between fine-grained performance levels and a wide spectrum of increases.
In fact much of the motivational impact can be achieved within a fairly coarse-grained model, even a binary model whereby everyone gets a standardized increment except those who’ve consistently performed below expectations. As long as the bar isn’t set artificially low, as it is in the current PMDS scenario, the requirement to be in say the top two thirds will motivate an appreciable number of average time-servers to up their game.
Add in a rarefied third level of reward for the really exceptional cases and you’ve got the guts of workable system that will show real productivity gains as long as people trust that its fairly administered.
Shurely shome mishtake? No?
Do you mean that surely this breaks the recruitment embargo?
I don’t think it does, as these work experience places seem more akin to unpaid & time-limited internships than real jobs. AKAIF the remuneration is limited to what one would have received on social welfare anyway, so its pretty much a wash budget-wise.
That said, it does sound highly exploitative to have a fourth-level graduate sitting beside a less-qualified permanent colleague doing the same work for a fraction of the money.
Prop Joe: your point about the civil service work experience proposal is fair. When I was a ’stagiaire’ in the European Commission in Brussels some years back there were loads of instances of the interns on 600 euro a month breaking their backs. They’d do 60 hour weeks on the (skilled) work that their extremely well remunerated bosses were shovelling their way, before trilling a ‘Bon Weekend’ at 2pm on a Friday and zooming off to well appointed holiday homes.
However. The experience gained by working in the institutions is incredibly valuable. And if it came down to a choice between having graduates or recently redundant workers on the dole because they might possibly be exploited by lazy civil servants, or helping them to delevop skills and knowledge in productive internships – as well as giving them a good reason to get out of bed in the morning, it’s hard to justify the former on a point of principle.
Damian, are you sure you’re not getting the wrong end of the stick about the piece?
I only use the term aspirational once, and I think it’s fair to say that that wasn’t the main point or thrust of the piece. And to be honest I was thinking more in terms of – as related to Proposition Joe’s thoughts about implementation of measurements of output/etc – the difficulties implicit to some of the ideas put forward, not that they wouldn’t be attempted. I hadn’t heard Pat Rabbittes comments before you mentioned them and still haven’t…
Nor, and I’d stress this, did I mention the component elements of the Government, or cast aspersions on either of them or try to suggest that one was propping up the other (to be honest surely that’s a dual dynamic at this stage
). I was simply looking at the policy matters as regards the public sector. No more or less.
Seems like a lot of effort on your part to tackle a single word. And that’s a pity since your contribution here is always welcome (just like PJs) and I’d be more interested in your thoughts on PS reform and what else I wrote above. Re the point as regards the PS attracting others, good to hear, but I’d be dubious that given the current rhetoric there are many who’d see it as ’secure’ in the former sense of that world, or given the impending pay cuts that it’s quite as fantastic as you point to.
Re your second comment. Lazy civil servants? Hmmm. Again, who mentioned that? The point is that bringing more people into the CS/PS seems to break the spirit if not indeed the letter of the embargo. Are those 3rd and 4th level graduates going to be paid or not? If not why not? That seems somewhat exploitative, but it also seems odd if we are to believe that the PS is being streamlined for efficiency, because I’m not sure what ‘extra’ skills they will bring that will be appropriate to the feast, and if it’s generalised ones well, why not pull random people off the dole and give them a fair go?
PJ, isn’t there something a little stick the finger in the air to tell what way the wind is blowing about your point? It’s not that I disagree, in fact I suspect you’re right, we’d still wind up with standardized increments, but… again… it’s all pretty vague and then relating that to pay increments, etc… seems equally vague.
Re the extra recruitment, and this in a sense is the same point as I address to Damien, simply because someone is a fourth-level graduate doesn’t mean they’re in some sense better qualified to do someone else’s job. I have a doctorate which incorporates history, economics, public policy and other areas, but I’m feck all use at fixing a car engine, or working professionally with statistics, or whatever. Trust me, you don’t want me going near your car. You really don’t.
I’ve noticed that some people have been puzzled as to why ISME has been so vehement in its demands for public sector wage cuts: surely less money in the pockets of so many averagely-paid people will hit retail sales etc, thus damaging ISME members?
This morning, though, ISME put up a woman whose name I didn’t catch, rather than the ubiquitous Mark Fielding, to answer the question on ‘Morning Ireland.’ She didn’t put a tooth in it: public sector wages needed to fall so that private sector employers could cut their wages too. Simple as that. The nearer we get to the budget, the more honest all sides are becoming about their motives.
Note the choreography. First we’re told that there are massive wage cuts in the private sector and hence there have to be PS cuts as well. On a constant basis we’re told that wage gaps between public and private sectors are great, then greater and so on. Then, in dribs and drabs from both private sources and the CSO we see that that’s not so (and what of the latest CSO report which casts cold water on the ‘gap’ which I’ll post something up tomorrow about). So the emphasis shifts back to the PS in order to arrive at the outcome you describe above.
It’s utterly cynical, but what’s really appalling about it is that it entirely disregards how difficult it is in this society for so many workers, private or public to get by and how these very policies are going to make that worse again. I found the taxation experts hand-wringing in the IT yesterday about the issue pretty poor…
Of course the follow up question is why and how ISME can justify that outcome?
Interesting point there about wanting to change the public sector culture to “create a performance culture based on achieving outcomes rather than compliance with processes”.
This might create some perverse incentives – for example in some sectors, ensuring a proper process could be more pertinent than a simple enhanced “outcome” (which we all know will be enforced in a purely bean-counting way) To take a crude example,say a Garda Superintendent is directing his officers to focus their speed traps in a dangerous section of road.
Then the auditors come along and say that his outcomes (drivers caught speeding) are too low. Therefore he changes his “process” to one of having his officers have traps on straight stretches of road where there is an abrupt change in the speed limit (the so-called “shooting fish in a barrel” style of speed trap).
Voila! Outcome improves.
But is it a better service? Some might wonder.
Precisely. Or what about the issue of case loads in particularly sensitive areas in the social service? We’ve seen the pernicious effects of that in the past year or two in the UK.
It’s not that I don’t see reasons for proper oversight, it’s essential and it’s also essential that outcomes are placed front and centre, but from my own experience in the private sector I’ve seen the unintended consequence of such approaches being a stultifying dynamic where aspects of ‘outcomes’ are increased (yes, we’ve produced x number of product y this month) but the overall quality falls off (z number of product y were incorrectly assembled – and I’ve seen this both in relation to products and say sales or admin targets). Which needs more oversight, which means greater degrees of management which sort of makes you wonder why one starts on that line in the first place…
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Focusing on invidious comparisons of public and private pay is an ongoing ploy to divert attention from the gross income and wealth inequalities throughout Irish society: disparities that will be aggravated by NAMA and by the proposed budget measures.