GOVERNMENT’S BEHAVIOUR during the public sector strike has, at best, confirmed how little it understands the public sector wage bill and, at worst, has highlighted the way the system protects the real fat cats who are paid the most and earn huge salaries and bonuses, no matter how dismal their performance.
While Parliament’s public accounts committee regularly calls on the executive to address that situation, Minister of Public Service & Administration Richard Baloyi admitted the remuneration and performance management in the “whole” public service needs an overhaul. But before Baloyi tackles that, he wants to appoint yet another panel to investigate and tell him what the Public Service Commission (PSC) and just about every chair of every committee in Parliament has already flagged.
During the three-week strike, the ANC-led Government went out of its way to paint itself as a victim and warned anything over and above its initial 5,6% offering for salary increases would be unsustainable. It warned Government’s salary expenditure was already “crowding out” other expenditure.
However, research by the Labour Research Service (LRS) suggests the most dangerous drain on the national Budget (one-third is consumed by public sector salaries) may not be the salaries of unionised workers, who tend to be at the lower end of the salary scale.
LRS deputy director Trenton Elsley says: “By my calculations, an 8,3% increase now would keep the level of purchasing power of public sector workers at 2007 levels, assuming inflation of 7% over the next 12 months. I’m aware my inflation estimate is higher than those of ‘analysts’ but then I’m not in the habit of talking inflation down. Even so, the benchmark is a conservative one, pegging real wages at 2007 levels – hardly runaway real wage gains.”
Public Service Association spokesman Leon Gilbert agrees and says the debate about high wage costs in the public sector can’t focus on the cost of the annual increases and has to look at the “whole package” – which, he says, includes salaries/bonuses being paid to the middle and upper echelons of SA’s administration as well as the salaries and spending of politicians themselves.
Indeed, the disparity between the lowest and highest earners in the public service has widened significantly over the past decade. So much so it’s, according to University of Johannesburg’s Professor Sakhela Bulhungu, now unmatched in any other country – developed or developing.
“If you compare the top and bottom earners, it’s chalk and cheese. You aren’t going to find this kind of disparity in any public service in the world,” says Buhlungu, who is also critical of the bungling way Government behaved during the strike, especially when it took out adverts in national newspapers listing the salaries public servants earn – salaries which proved to be embarrassingly inflated and incorrect.
Bargaining council figures show the lowest entry level position in the public service (without this year’s increase) is a basic of R51 000/year. That escalates quite rapidly. Clerical staff earn between R73 000 and R124 000/year. Contrary to what Government published in its advertisements showing entry level teachers in 2010 earning a total package of R229 000/year, an entry level teaching post (without this year’s increase) falls just north of a senior clerical post at R141 000 basic and a total package of R185 000.
Assistant directors in national, provincial and local governments earn between R232 000 and R283 000/year, while deputy directors earn between R445 000 and R528 000 a year. Senior managers – including chief directors, deputy directors-general and directors-general – earn between R600 000 and R1,3m/year (a personal assistant to a director-general earns around R378 000/year).
“After director level things get really crazy and they also get all sorts of perks added. The fact that the increase negotiated by unions is then applied to all salaries reinforces that gap. Top salaries should be capped,” says Buhlungu, who questions why remuneration for senior public service managers has escalated as it has.
“There was a time when there was parity between what staff at universities and public servants got paid. For example, a director-general and a professor at a university, who is also paid with public money, used to be paid the same. But now a professor earns the same as a director (between R400 000 and R590 000/year),” adds Buhlungu, who also raises questions about how well qualified public servants in senior management are. For example, an entry-level director in the public service, who earns the same as a professor at a university, is the equivalent of a newly qualified graduate student with an MA. “What you’re generating here is an expectation at the bottom (earners) that they can also get a piece of this (lavish spending),” says Buhlungu.
That salary disparity also serves to reinforce a status quo where Government can’t attract and retain quality professionals in areas such as education and health, where they’re desperately needed.
Research into teachers’ salaries conducted by Stellenbosch University’s Paula Armstrong concluded the more qualified and more experienced teachers become, the more they’re disadvantaged by their earning potential in the public sector. Teacher unions agree, and say a teacher with 30 years’ experience is only likely to benefit with a 40% escalation in salary over those years from entry level.
While Bulhungu says many students have turned offers from universities down because of the salaries they can command in the public service, politicians themselves have done nothing to curb their earnings and spending and, therefore, increase animosity between the ruling ANC and its labour alliance partners.
To make things worse, Government has fobbed off criticism of lavish expenditure by and on ministers and senior public servants. While the Democratic Alliance’s Wasteful Expenditure Monitor records how President Jacob Zuma’s Government has spent R1,5bn on luxury cars, five-star hotel accommodation, parties, tickets for sports events and “self-congratulatory” advertising, Baloyi has defended that, saying ministers couldn’t be expected to use scooters. Their cars are, he argued, essential tools for their jobs.
While politicians and what they cost the State is a significant aspect of the animosity between the ANC and its labour alliance partners, the stark earning disparities in the public service are exacerbated by the dismal lack of performance management throughout Government.
While it’s true that has to apply to all employees, from the lowest to the highest earners, the fact is non-performance by ministers and senior Government management has a much bigger ripple effect throughout SA’s bureaucracy, including provincial and local government. Managing and monitoring the performance of senior (and most highly paid) bureaucrats are complicated by the fact most are deployed cadres and appointed more for their political affiliation than their qualification for the job and/or experience.
All this adds to the overall costs, directly and indirectly. Without fail, the PSC tells Parliament that every year and provides figures to back up its argument. Baloyi’s panel is unlikely to come up with any different conclusions, which begs the question about when Government is going to have what it takes to make changes that will really reduce costs and improve performances.