Husbands: Don’t frustrate the Civil Service
IF the Civil Service is not working efficiently, it can wreak havoc on a country’s economy, says Minister in the Ministry of Foreign Trade Sandra Husbands.
Speaking on the importance of ensuring public service workers were appointed without lengthy delays, she noted it was counterproductive to frustrate these individuals.
“Within your economy you may have someone who wants to start a business, let’s say a laundromat where you want to employ 15 workers. They have made their application, identified the place in which they want to operate, they have started a process of interviewing persons looking to bring them onto work and they have sent off for the goods and equipment with which they need to start their business. When that equipment gets to the Port and there are long delays in clearing that container, if the licenses they have to have for inspections and those things are delayed, what it means is that every week that business is not completed by our Civil Service to enable our private sector to move forward, then you are doing a number of things. You are delaying jobs, and because of this delaying consumption in your economy as well as because the business has not started in the way it should where it would buy supplies, so other businesses will suffer, and because it is not generating a profit as yet, Government cannot get revenues. All because of delays at the Port, delays in getting licenses and delays in getting inspections.
“Therefore, a demotivated Civil Service and one that has other concerns because they are not comfortable in the environment, will find that they may not focus in performing those everyday tasks with the speed and dispatch that the economy requires. So regularising the status of those workers is one of the means of helping to improve the output and productivity of the service and therefore feeling growth and energy into your wider economy. This is why it is so important and counterproductive to frustrate your Civil Service,” she explained.