Dept addressing abuse of system

By HELEN TARAWA
MINISTER of Finance and Rural Development Charles Abel says the Finance Department is putting in place short-term measures to limit abuse of the payroll system.
Responding to questions on civil servants’ salary blowout, Abel told The National that the Personnel Management and Finance departments were looking into the details.
Without divulging details on what those short-term measures were, Abel said the departments were in the process of engaging an auditor.
“I’m working on a number of things at Finance,” he said.
“One of them is payroll and getting the long-delayed audit of the system going and also immediate short-term measures to limit abuse.
“The engagement of auditor is being finalised with the State solicitor.
“I’m going into details of the payroll system now with Finance and Department of Personnel Management.”
Public Service Minister Westly Nukundj had initiated the process of fixing the ongoing issue of payroll overrun that has been a concern for past and present governments. He said there were 6,070-plus unattached officers on Government payroll which amounted to K260mil to K270mil every year.
Nukundj queried the number of new recruits in government departments and agencies not on government payroll.
He said the Government was not necessarily trying to reduce costs but rather establish a number that was effectively performing duties against a position that the government paid for.
Treasury Minister Sam Basil said he would release a statement in relation to the public service salaries blowout.