Civil servants to move out

By HELEN TARAWA
PUBLIC servants based in Waigani will be transferred or shifted to provinces and districts, Prime Minister James Marape says.
He said they should be ready to move to the districts.
“No more – Waigani will (not) be centred in heavy public service.
“If you are a planner, works engineer or Education Department officer, prepare to migrate to the provinces and districts.
“We will start the migration process so that Waigani is no more a centralised planning-based operation. Those activities are taking place in the provinces and districts.”
He said public servants’ benefits like health insurance and housing would be tied to a performance-based system.
“A huge cost on maintaining public service must translate to actual delivery of performance isolating corruption, complacency and wastage,” Marape said.
“Our policy for public service will be (an) encapsulated corporate plan by the Department of Personnel Management (DPM).
“We stand to improve public servants performance and give them incentives but tie it down to performance. Whilst they serve our country the most, 70 per cent of total budget in any fiscal year has always been going towards paying public servants.”
Marape said public servants consumed more than 70 per cent of the budget.
“Whilst we do our endeavours to ensure that health, housing and welfare is given that incremental increase, it is incumbent for every public servant to ensure that we lift our game.
“Public servants must respond to that, their performance must be improved and their contracts must be linked to a performance-based contract.
“We will discuss with our superfund as to how best we will ensure that the Government contributions would be geared to helping public servants currently in service be assisted in health and housing.
“Early next year, there will be a specific announcement as to how best we could assist our public servants.
“We will pick up DPM’s corporate plan and look at the health insurance policy, housing, superfund issues and current pay structure issues comparing to cost of living in our country.”