How the public sector have fared under Labour

[Puggit]

	Public Sector	Private Sector
Average pay	£22,405	£20,998
Productivity change (97-07)	-3.4%	+28%
Employer pension contributions	19.4%	6%
Average annual payrise	2.8%	1.1%
Average Retirement Age	58	65
Average sick days	9.7	6.4

Sunday Times article

[pacman1]

Says it all really. The column headers should really be the other way round imho.

[Zod]

There'll be somebody from the public sector along in a moment to plead poverty.

A million of them on the dole will cost less than their salaries and benefits. They'll cost even less if they get private sector jobs.

[Mclovin]

dont forget public sector workers have all got rbs and northern rock mortgages and supposedly if these banks go bust the whole worlds bank system will collapse....

[esselte]

pacman1 said:

Says it all really. The column headers should really be the other way round imho.

[pacman1]

erm, except the productivity figures.

[zac510]

I read this in the print edition and there was another graph saying we still had less public sector employees than Sweden, Norway and France (from memory here).

[Puggit]

esselte said:

pacman1 said:

Says it all really. The column headers should really be the other way round imho.

I get it now, he's saying that the private sector should be the one with the better figures.

[pacman1]

That's it. Sorry. Ah, the pitfalls of posting without thinking fully first.

[esselte]

Puggit said:

esselte said:

pacman1 said:

Says it all really. The column headers should really be the other way round imho.

I get it now, he's saying that the private sector should be the one with the better figures.

Ah OK..I thought he meant that the figures were wrong..

[Ten Ninety]

musclecarmad said:

too expensive, too bloated, too many sick days, too high pension contributions, too high pay and too little productivity.

I've never really understood people whingeing about the 'good life' of public sector workers. Especially not those who are successful and doing well for themselves in the private sector.

If you've got the necessary skills and ability, come and join the great public sector party and enjoy the fabulous benefits, quality of life, security and lack of pressure that we all apparently have. Of course, you may be disappointed with the reality when you get here, but at least then you'll be able to speak from experience.

And if you find that actually you haven't got the skills and ability to get a good public sector job, perhaps a better idea might be to quit complaining and retrain until you have?

In the interests of fairness, I would say the same thing to stupid unionised public sector workers who complain about private sector bonuses and pay... if you think you could hack it in the private sector then go and join them and see how much salary your skillset will command over there.

[cs02rm0]

Ten Ninety said:

And if you find that actually you haven't got the skills and ability to get a good public sector job

[Spiritual_Beggar]

For a sector that generates absolutely ZERO revenue, and actually hinders, rather than benefits the most private companies (thereby making the private sector less efficient and more costly), those Public sector figures are ridiculous.



It's far too large. Far too innefficient.

[Ten Ninety]

Spiritual_Beggar said:

For a sector that generates absolutely ZERO revenue, and actually hinders, rather than benefits the most private companies (thereby making the private sector less efficient and more costly), those Public sector figures are ridiculous.

It's far too large. Far too innefficient.

You may well be right, perhaps it is too large and it's certainly inefficient. But, equally, I know from my experience in the education sector that there are thousands of private sector companies, from massive corporations to sole traders, who are also scooping up huge amounts of the government's 'largesse' in education spending by supplying goods and services, often at hugely inflated prices. I'm sure it's similar in health and other areas.

If any government makes serious cuts to public sector spending to improve 'efficiency' then that's going to have a pretty serious impact on all those private companies who are also effectively feeding from the state's hand. And even if it just cuts pay for public sector workers, then that's effectively taking the money away from those private sector companies with whom we currently spend our salaries.

I don't think the whole 'zero revenue' thing is quite as simple as you suggest. Or have I missed something?

[N Dentressangle]

Ten Ninety said:

Spiritual_Beggar said:

For a sector that generates absolutely ZERO revenue, and actually hinders, rather than benefits the most private companies (thereby making the private sector less efficient and more costly), those Public sector figures are ridiculous.

It's far too large. Far too innefficient.

You may well be right, perhaps it is too large and it's certainly inefficient. But, equally, I know from my experience in the education sector that there are thousands of private sector companies, from massive corporations to sole traders, who are also scooping up huge amounts of the government's 'largesse' in education spending by supplying goods and services, often at hugely inflated prices. I'm sure it's similar in health and other areas.

If any government makes serious cuts to public sector spending to improve 'efficiency' then that's going to have a pretty serious impact on all those private companies who are also effectively feeding from the state's hand. And even if it just cuts pay for public sector workers, then that's effectively taking the money away from those private sector companies with whom we currently spend our salaries.

I don't think the whole 'zero revenue' thing is quite as simple as you suggest. Or have I missed something?

That would be my feeling too.

20 years ago there probably was a fairly discrete public / private sector split. These days there are many parts of the 'public' sector which are 'privately' run.

My experience of the 'public' sector includes plenty of inefficiency and jobsworthiness, sure, but also plenty of private contractors doing very nicely thank you from the public purse.

[SeeFive]

Surely not major consultancies like, just for example, naming no names... cough - EDS - cough. Jobs for the boys with a 500% markup for time spent covering their own arses in case when it all goes wrong. Surely not.

Until public sector organisations start taking responsibility and making decisions for themselves with appropriate accountability, this waste will continue and projects will continue to fail.

Then perhaps I will not be on a proof of concept at a large government department and be faced with a 30something reasonably graded tt who opens with "I know what you computer blokes are like, working long hours etc - I will not be doing that as my pay is not like yours and I am only here for the pension".

[N Dentressangle]

SeeFive said:

Surely not major consultancies like, just for example, naming no names... cough - EDS - cough. Jobs for the boys with a 500% markup for time spent covering their own arses in case when it all goes wrong. Surely not.

Until public sector organisations start taking responsibility and making decisions for themselves with appropriate accountability, this waste will continue and projects will continue to fail.

Do you mean this company:

http://h10134.www1.hp.com/

I'd never heard of EDS, but that's what Google returned?

Competitive tendering has often meant that public sector is forced to use contractors like this rather than do things in house. It's frustrating to see money spent in this way, I agree. It also seems to be amazingly inefficient and open to cronyism and corruption, but that's just my impression.

In areas like IT though, it often seems to me that the public sector doesn't attract or employ people talented enough to do what's needed. I might be wrong, but that's often been my experience.

[catso]

cs02rm0 said:

Ten Ninety said:

And if you find that actually you haven't got the skills and ability to get a good public sector job

Have another

[SeeFive]

N Dentressangle said:

SeeFive said:

Surely not major consultancies like, just for example, naming no names... cough - EDS - cough. Jobs for the boys with a 500% markup for time spent covering their own arses in case when it all goes wrong. Surely not.

Until public sector organisations start taking responsibility and making decisions for themselves with appropriate accountability, this waste will continue and projects will continue to fail.

Do you mean this company:

http://h10134.www1.hp.com/

I'd never heard of EDS, but that's what Google returned?

Competitive tendering has often meant that public sector is forced to use contractors like this rather than do things in house. It's frustrating to see money spent in this way, I agree. It also seems to be amazingly inefficient and open to cronyism and corruption, but that's just my impression.

In areas like IT though, it often seems to me that the public sector doesn't attract or employ people talented enough to do what's needed. I might be wrong, but that's often been my experience.

Indeed I do mean that leopard with new spots. Your impression is not too far removed from the truth - same old approach, different name. It's not really about the lack of talented individuals in Public Sector, it is about risk aversion to the detriment of a project and a decision process that has no real accountability as it would in the private sector.

I see companies - and specifically in your sector if your profile is true, making incredibly brave decisions to do things in different ways from the very top CXO level - with FULL accountability in a matter of days for seriously complex solutions. They are saving millions on deployment timeframes, IT infrastructure expenditure, and creating a more agile environment by putting their Logistical solutions on, non-traditional platforms to massive real money ROI benefit. Companies such as Gefco and La Poste as just a couple of examples.

Even after a long bake off against competition in UK Public Sector, and comfortably demonstrating similar benefits over the competition that actually failed to complete the POC, the net result is that similar technologies still get rejected on the basis that "nobody got fired for buying IBM / Microsoft" by the Systems Integrators. Despite the fact that added to their bake-off success, the rejected companies have a 100% reference-able customer base deploying valid solutions across 250 corporations and no failed projects - very unusual in the IT sector. And the SI still cannot make the decision staring them directly in the face.

Sad but true. Compare that with private sector companies such as Gefco who take the responsibility themselves to make those decisions. With the de-regulation of postal services in France, La Poste are no longer public sector - and have been largely in control of their decision, but chose to implement that decision through an SI. In fact, since that massive success, they have joined forces with their SI to form a company and market this solution to other logistics companies worldwide - how many public sector projects have that kind of success?

Contracted public sector SI's such as (and not only) HP (or EDS for those that have been in IT a bit longer) tend to take the "safer" route, and frequently fail to deliver on their massively bloated timeframes or budgets using traditional, outmoded platforms and implementation methods.

All in my incredibly frustrated experience and opinion of course.

[Ten Ninety]

catso said:

cs02rm0 said:

Ten Ninety said:

And if you find that actually you haven't got the skills and ability to get a good public sector job

Have another

Indeed. It has been pretty funny seeing some of the ex-private sector lot 'crossing the floor' to see if they can have a go at my job and (in one case literally) running away screaming. In fairness, a couple of them have made a pretty good fist of it, and good on them for doing so. But every single one that I've met, even the ones who have eventually got to grips with it, said that they massively underestimated the range of skills they'd need, and the pressure and demands that would be placed upon them.

Perhaps 'qualifications and experience' would have been less contentious than 'skills and ability'? Or are you rofling because you think any private sector worker could just walk in and be a good policeman, nurse, teacher or doctor?

Edited by Ten Ninety on Sunday 3rd January 18:00