Thursday, October 03, 2002

Just back from two days at the Civil Service College. I was on a Creative Thinking course. Hard to tell my boss that I spent a good part of Tuesday on my hands and knees stapling coffee cups to a sheet of paper! When I go over to Blog Spot Plus, I'll put up a picture of something else I did.

Every time I go on courses I am struck by the diversity and intellect of my fellow civil servants. Hey, I know we get a bad rap - tea ladies, bowler hats and all that stuff. But, the modern Civil Service is very professional. Not only that, given that there are 400,000 of us there is a wide range of jobs. Many of those use words like "customer" and "service" which you would never have heard when I joined in 1985.

Back at work to a ton of e-mails and paper, crises left, right and centre. I guess that's why I get paid big b- er, come to think of it I don't get paid big bucks. Don't get me started on pay issues. Okay, I'm reasonably comfortable. People like nurses are criminally underpaid. All I'd like is a fair shake. The last few pay settlements have been alright, but management are always out to screw us. It's made worse by the loss of Civil Service wide terms and conditions under Thatcher. This particular chicken came home to roost with the creation of DEFRA from the old Min of Ag and Fish and the Environment Protection Group from DETR. MAFF employees at my level were earning about 5-10% lower than DETR colleagues. Hence, loads of DETR people made a hasty retreat - leaving DEFRA for DTLR now ODPM and DfT (are you following this?) There was a mighty scrap with unions to get pay harmonised, but it's still a mess and could all come tumbling down with the next change of government machinery.

:: Posted by pete @ 07:51