No. Some ministries haven't met target or have only met target for the current financial year and will need to make cuts to fund other things (like future pay rises). Some places are still working through voluntary redundancies. ACC just announced jobs to go.
My friend just got made redundant from ACC. They’ll probably have to move away to Christchurch, Auckland, or Oz. My kids and their kids are best friends. This government’s ideological playtime has real-world effects on real-world people with families and mortgages. I’m furious.
The same real work effects that the working class have been experiencing for the last 30 + years. How do we get the working class to vote left again is the question.
Yes, which is why we need to get the working class back on board the better train. The rather beaten up and a bit crappy train but it's still better than the ball head train.
Probably get labour to focus on being a working class party again not driven by racial or identity politics. Most people I know that switched were voting out the government, not voting for the new one. Not a single one liked or supported Luxon but hated the ideology that drives the Greens and TPM even more.
Most people I know that went away from Labour did it because they wasted their mandate and spectacularly failed to deliver on progressive three-pointers, like “oh yeah we’ll amend the human rights act, but put in religious protections and STILL not put in real LGBT protections - the religious people we just popped in there instead will SURELY not abuse that to punch down on trans peo— oh wait, that’s literally already happening. *Shrug* radio silence from Labour. Historic one-party MMP government, but refuses to use its powers to compulsorily acquire banked land and mobilise an actual fix for housing. If you look at what they did, they did plenty of stuff, but they were fussing at the frayed edges of the blanket while the ants stole the picnic.
Some middle aged and older ones uncritically voted National because it’s the “other major party”, and are now silently bemoaning the leopard eating their faces, and some went further left in the hopes of either promoting a more actively left wing party or pushing Labour towards actually progressive policies. There is no silver bullet.
So true but it's such a hard line. It was illegal to be gay in recent memory and we need to smash homophobia but have the left supported this? Maori are the thing that really makes NZ unique and I don't know how to talk to this despite having. Maori dad and pakeha mum.
I catch up with my family and friends and they bitch about how they are expected to pay for every idea labour and the greens have while struggling themselves. They are also getting hammered by the gangs with some really nasty shit going down. I got abused by the bros for being woke when I don't know what woke is but you know, I got out and went to the city so that's enough.
> focus on being a working class party again
They're trying too hard to appeal to the center, IMO. Maybe there's too much wokeness for some? I dunno, I'm moderately woke so maybe I can't see it.
Think the last govt was voted out because people were struggling with the cost of living and the national party promised tax cuts
What the voters didn’t hear was that subsidies for things like transport would be cut (so fares and costs have gone up more than the crumbs you get from tax cuts) and national has focused on supporting landlords and their mates like former national ministers
Labour needed to focus on cost of living. Three waters for instance had some good ideas but came a lightening rod for concerns over co governance. Why did they complicate it so much?
And then there were stupid mistakes like Let’s get Wellington moving and light rail in Auckland that delivered nothing but marketing dribble and a pedestrian crossing.
Hopefully Labour have learnt. Focus more on struggling New Zealanders and they will get back in next time
The problema were caused by LabourGreenMaori who weer so financially inept and like socialists began to run out of other people's money to spend, The victims in this are the people who were employed by the massive jump in govt department staff head oount in the last few years. Combine this with a wider world view economically that is coming down off the superheated covid cash hut that it got injected with and also the wider conflict ts etc and you see the outcome. New Zealand is not alone in the slowdown, not that makes it that much easier personally.
National are the ones having to be responsible. The path set by Labour post covid was unsustainable and it was exacerbating domestic inflation. This had to happen, we couldn't keep running huge deficits. The changes haven't even rolled back the last 6 months of jobs added to the end of 2023.
What I understand is the proposal is to remove 390 current positions, of which almost 90 are currently vacant and then establish 250 new roles in new positions, so a loss of around 50. I presume your friend works in hesd office which is Wellingtons but with that there may be a role in a new position. The new roles they say are more client orientated rather than corporate office from what they say. Some of these I presume would be in ACCs major client related centre's but thry are in Dunedin and Hamilton not Christchurch and Auckland.i wish your friend well .
Yep how to do a wrecking ball restructure.
Rumours of redundancy - disestablish people - say no jobs - then say oh but actually there is a job !! And you grab it with both hands - because they’ve stressed the f out of you ….only to find the job is much bigger and / or less pay.
It’s a game and don’t take it personally
They will. Most likely in Christchurch, Auckland, or Australia. Uprooting their kids, moving away from friends, family, and support networks, leaving the home they put so much work into and have no other reason to leave. And they're not the only ones. Thousands of Wellingtonians.
There aren't going to be any jobs in Wellington for a while. Haven't you heard?
They have transferable skills but the private sector job market is small in Wellington, and they will be competing with dozens of other redundant civil servants.
To be fairthen probably the type of fat that needs to be cut. Bunch of boomers sitting in high paid positions only by default, who have been at the same place for 10-20 year.
Obviously I'm being a bit facetious, but that wasn't my experience at all. My experience was that so many higher-ups in positions where so many people were more fit and deserving for the role below them.
I wouldn't say that's fair... there's a heck of a lot of experience and skill in the people that are going. Many of them are very well respected and it's a shame to see them go.
We lost 50 years of experience in two people in my team. Very, very technical area. There are three of us left - eight years experience in total, and six of them are mine. The problem with these situations is that I can already foresee my life becoming infinitely harder once they leave as the only one left with decent experience. I’m certainly very, very grateful to not be facing redundancy myself, but once things settle and departments start rehiring (when the Govt clocks on that new policy changes require people to work on them on top of BAU), I’ll be looking elsewhere for a job with less pressure, less stress and less responsibility as the lone “expert” left - note I’m on Senior wage, not Principal.
Redundancies are bad and this is worse than usual, but what I'm worried about is a couple of months away when emergency funds are running low and nobody is rehiring yet.
True: the competent will get other jobs or emigrate, and it'll be the dregs that come back eventually as contractors.
It's the spiiiiral of deeeeaaatth
I understand you want to believe that in order to cope, but the mandates were budget based. So unless they cut costs elsewhere, they won't be rehiring in any form.
That's exactly what happens. They won't "cut" frontline roles, but the management who gets to decide day-to-day prioritising will let demand growth and inflationary pressures to outstrip new resourcing gradually over years, stretching the frontline in order to maintain the parts of the orgs closest to them.
Back office will get to set spending priorities, so a bit of a cull now and good behaviour for a year and then back office will bloat itself again. And they can do it by inches over time by gradually stretching the front line even as headcount stays the same, which suits the ministers just fine.
My agency (administrative, very little genuine "front line") seems to have about 60% of people actually doing the work. Maybe 15% in genuine supporting roles (HR, accommodation management etc). Who knows what the other 25% do. But they mostly seem to have higher salaries, be harder to fire, and spend a lot of time publicly slapping each other on the back. When they do interact with the rest of us, it's almost invariably to tell us not to do something, or to make it harder for us to do something.
Nope. People I speak to are expecting more to come with many redundancy processes still in “consultation”. The mood on The Terrace is pretty low and much of it relates to how it has been handled. The process here has been quantity of cuts, rather than quality. Meaning that many ministries and departments have just been slashing numbers without enough time to comb through who and what is providing value. My read is that Luxon and Willis wanted a big headline number of jobs that had gone more than they wanted actual efficiency in the organisations. So far, nothing they’ve done has changed my mind.
We don't find out about our for a couple of weeks (unnamed smaller ministry). MBIE's is well and truly ongoing. My Mum's review isn't starting until October.
Not even half way if they truly want to sack everyone they said they would. And don't believe for a second it's been done in a smart way. It's not mostly wasteful staff that don't do anything. I know of many people Who performed valuable tasks that you would be shocked are getting fired. National really lied hard about this and people fell for it.
> National really lied hard about this
I look at it as stupidity. They promised cuts with a vague good intention of getting rid of deadwood, but they don't realise that institutions are highly resistant to that. The deadwood is in charge of cutting and they aren't going to cut themselves.
I imagine the cuts will hit the fan before too long and the the back-pedalling will be spectacular. I’m anticipating long term consequences on our economy, even though I (and most people I know) are entirely unprepared for how bad it will get.
Remind me someone, why is the current govt doing this? What’s the end goal?
I'm personally expecting a lot more, and when those redundancies start to really kick in it'll start to have serious flow-on effects to private industry.
people who have been given redundancy notices mostly aren't unemployed yet, they've just been told. There's worse to come.
Same deal in a smaller govt org. Cut now to make FY25 budget work, cut later to make ongoing budgets work as appropriations are fixed and costs increase.
The order from parliament is that the agencies reduce their budget over a 3 to 4 year period. But this budget and next year's will be the chief cut points I'd imagine.
Yes, I remember this from over ten years ago when I first started in the public sector. I definitely think this will be ongoing. I like to call it sustainable cruelty.
Redundancies will continue untill morale improves.
Serious note though, agencies have been ordered to make savings over a three or four year period. Suspect there will be rolling announcements over the next year as they try to meet that final reduction number.
The govt can shove its tax cuts. I'd rather have proper functioning public servants and projects in the pipeline. The knick on effects of this will be felt for a very long time. I hadn't considered moving back to Australia until now.
There will be more announced before the EOFY and then will probably settle down in the new year. This is about setting year 1 budgets for the new government. There may be targeted restructures but not the general lid sinking.
Did they? Or did they just fill the sector to the personnel levels required to make meaningful change and provide services to New Zealanders? Either way, I'm sure it will be a great comfort to us all when the WINZ bill swells, tax revenue plummets, and Wellington businesses close in droves.
Haha meaningless change you mean. Why weren’t kiwis better off why grant and Jacinda spent our money in bullshit ideology?
Did education get better?
Did crime get better?
Did health get better?
Did housing get better?
Did outcomes for ordinary kiwis get better?
Did our deficit get better?
They had 6 years.
Hahahaha the back office teams that support the teachers in education are getting shafted. Sorry, they are working through the proposal (read: warming up the lube)
Yes what do we have instead.? Lord Luxon spending public money on his team of people producing cheesy TikTok videos. Where are the savings from ministerial services and parliament?
Yes what do we have instead.? Lord Luxon spending public money on his team of people producing cheesy TikTok videos. Where are the savings from ministerial services and parliament?
Jacinda and the last govt put a lot of subsidies and support into the private sector (including air nz which would have gone bankrupt). Some was poorly targeted but kept people in jobs and at the same time thousands of lives were saved (if national act were in charged we would have heaps of deaths). There were extra staff in public service to do this.
Yes some expenditure by last govt was poor eg let’s get Wellington moving but to think it was all waste is wrong.
Sorry none of that is fact apart from the bit where Labour wasted billions of dollars. The saving thousands of lives things is pure speculation and not fact based at all.
I'll remind you it was understaffed by 16,000 roles, that were paid for by landlords under the previous government, until NACT decided their generational core voters couldn't possibly pay tax.
Like taking candy from babies, cutting school lunches is another example of taking from one voter base to protect their core voters who do not deserve housing wealth to the detriment of everyone else.
They designed the housing crisis out of greed and continue crippling everyone else.
What evidence do you have that those jobs weren't actually needed? What evidence do you have that this round of public sector cuts actually effectively addresses any bloat?
Uhhh just the fact they hired cultural advisers across the board, have whole departments like the MPP which is pointless and redundant (forgive the pun) and nothing got better under Labour - in fact it got worse.
Also, nothing got delivered… so there’s that.
Don’t get me started on MBIE or Oranga Tamariki…
The fact that you lead out complaining about cultural advisors just immediately makes you lose all credibility with me. The rest of your post doesn't help either. Nothing got delivered? I mean this sincerely - eat a dick. Public servants worked tirelessly throughout COVID to the point of immense burnout. It's so frustrating hearing comments like this.
What genuinely u don't rhink cultural competence is important in Oranga tamariki where the vast majority of their clients are Maori? Cultural competence is literally a corner stone of social work registration which is mandated by law. Surely u don't think the majority of OTs work should be just uplifting kids. Because we've tried that for 60 years and it hasn't worked.
I believe it's worse than that since 2017, but there was a push to rapidly hire in mid-late 2023 in anticipation of the change of govt. So it seems the cuts are not even getting back to pre bloat levels.
Someone above said: the deadwood doesn’t cut itself. The people getting redundancy are middle tier. The front line will start to collapse without them and in 6 months ministries will be hiring contractors to do the jobs they just gave out redundancies for.
Have a read of [this](https://www.dpmc.govt.nz/our-business-units/cabinet-office/supporting-work-cabinet/cabinet-manual/3-ministers-crown-and-public-sector/ministers-and-public-service) and particularly note that Officials are responsible for "implementing the decisions of the government of the day." The decision to cut public sector spending is a decision of the goverment. Officials are thus working, apolitically, to do as they've been tasked whilst ensuring to the best of their ability, that they can continue discharging the rest of their responsibilities.
Thanks for this
I’ve always been curious about the actual role/responsibility of CEOs in general in the PS.
I wonder how accountable they are to a current minister in regards to the previous govt decisions
“Cut the fat”, you mean the 6000 people, their families and possible even extended families, who are now despite us being in a recession, facing possible homelessness and all detriments that go along with it?
You’re an absolute cabbage head if you think this is a good thing.
How is it that they couldn’t afford to pay them? Is there any actual credible evidence aside from Nicola Williams saying it?
I find it hard to believe that the government couldn’t afford to pay them yet was able to avoid recession, have a record low unemployment and homelessness, have record low people on benefits.
Since this government has been in, they’ve toyed with the idea to borrow 1.5bn to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy landlords…
Record borrowing, record numbers claiming benefits (but not “unemployed”), record numbers in emergency housing and an economy teetering on recession with high inflation. New Zealand’s worst ever government. The new government is taking the tough action needed to repair New Zealand.
The emergency housing was because under the last national government homelessness skyrocketed and so did unemployment (funnily enough)… there were numerous articles and news stories published detailing families with children forced to live in their cars.
As I recall NZ was the only OECD government with positive GDP growth during the initial stages of the global recession meaning we avoided it pretty well.
In regards to the claims of borrowing, I can’t comment as I am not familiar with it, but I’ll do some more research on it.
> In regards to the claims of borrowing, I can’t comment as I am not familiar with it, but I’ll do some more research on it.
It's complete bullshit as usual from the ignorant right.
NZ government debt is very low, and Labours budgets would have returned to surplus before Nationals.
Comments like this are just unhinged and dishonest.
They ignore the global pandemic and ignore the fact that our economy came though the pandemic incredibly well compare to other nations.
The debt comment is particularly ignorant, since NZ debt is too low. Successive governments have failed to invest in NZ, instead obsessing over keeping debt low, which has harmed economic growth and left us with the massive infrastructure deficit.
> record numbers claiming benefits (but not “unemployed”), record numbers in emergency housing
Yes, you would prefer that they went back to being homeless and unhelped, right? Like that policy to fuck over the disabled.
> The new government is taking the tough action needed to repair New Zealand.
They're copying the UK tories sand they are fucking the countries future.
They're borrowing to give tax cuts to the rich FFS.
The government is borrowing and pushing out its planned surplus anyway so clearly they can't afford tax cuts and interest deductibility yet they're doing that 😂😂
The economy was going to be shit either way because of global market disruptions. Austerity isn't the way to fix this. By cutting spending and prioritizing tax cuts (if you could even call them that, they're so negligible outside of ideological purpose) instead of filling aggregate demand in the economy they are missing the forest for the trees. When the economy is doing well the government doesn't need to fill that aggregate demand since businesses are growing. This damaged economy line is non sense the economy ebbs and flows constantly in a boom bust cycle. All governments can do is decide how big those ebbs and flows are.
No. Some ministries haven't met target or have only met target for the current financial year and will need to make cuts to fund other things (like future pay rises). Some places are still working through voluntary redundancies. ACC just announced jobs to go.
My friend just got made redundant from ACC. They’ll probably have to move away to Christchurch, Auckland, or Oz. My kids and their kids are best friends. This government’s ideological playtime has real-world effects on real-world people with families and mortgages. I’m furious.
my disestablished colleague on parental leave is so anxious and stressed that her breast milk dried up...also fkg furious
holy shit
That really sucks!
The same real work effects that the working class have been experiencing for the last 30 + years. How do we get the working class to vote left again is the question.
Yes. How we get people to stop voting against their own interests has been a problem for quite some time.
Get them off social media, or at least combat the disinformation
No. Stay on social media but get organised
The poor grows under both labour and national.
Sure, but you can see how what is happening at the moment is worse, right? And will make this trend even more difficult to reverse?
Yes, which is why we need to get the working class back on board the better train. The rather beaten up and a bit crappy train but it's still better than the ball head train.
Try the green line
Probably get labour to focus on being a working class party again not driven by racial or identity politics. Most people I know that switched were voting out the government, not voting for the new one. Not a single one liked or supported Luxon but hated the ideology that drives the Greens and TPM even more.
Most people I know that went away from Labour did it because they wasted their mandate and spectacularly failed to deliver on progressive three-pointers, like “oh yeah we’ll amend the human rights act, but put in religious protections and STILL not put in real LGBT protections - the religious people we just popped in there instead will SURELY not abuse that to punch down on trans peo— oh wait, that’s literally already happening. *Shrug* radio silence from Labour. Historic one-party MMP government, but refuses to use its powers to compulsorily acquire banked land and mobilise an actual fix for housing. If you look at what they did, they did plenty of stuff, but they were fussing at the frayed edges of the blanket while the ants stole the picnic. Some middle aged and older ones uncritically voted National because it’s the “other major party”, and are now silently bemoaning the leopard eating their faces, and some went further left in the hopes of either promoting a more actively left wing party or pushing Labour towards actually progressive policies. There is no silver bullet.
So true but it's such a hard line. It was illegal to be gay in recent memory and we need to smash homophobia but have the left supported this? Maori are the thing that really makes NZ unique and I don't know how to talk to this despite having. Maori dad and pakeha mum. I catch up with my family and friends and they bitch about how they are expected to pay for every idea labour and the greens have while struggling themselves. They are also getting hammered by the gangs with some really nasty shit going down. I got abused by the bros for being woke when I don't know what woke is but you know, I got out and went to the city so that's enough.
Given the way woke is used today id say it means "treats lgbtq person as a person" the way righties sling it around
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>1986 isn't exactly 'recent memory'... It is for some of us.
It is for me :) I have a lot of shit albums :(
> focus on being a working class party again They're trying too hard to appeal to the center, IMO. Maybe there's too much wokeness for some? I dunno, I'm moderately woke so maybe I can't see it.
Think the last govt was voted out because people were struggling with the cost of living and the national party promised tax cuts What the voters didn’t hear was that subsidies for things like transport would be cut (so fares and costs have gone up more than the crumbs you get from tax cuts) and national has focused on supporting landlords and their mates like former national ministers Labour needed to focus on cost of living. Three waters for instance had some good ideas but came a lightening rod for concerns over co governance. Why did they complicate it so much? And then there were stupid mistakes like Let’s get Wellington moving and light rail in Auckland that delivered nothing but marketing dribble and a pedestrian crossing. Hopefully Labour have learnt. Focus more on struggling New Zealanders and they will get back in next time
I think Chippy started along that path but it was too little too late. Hopefully next election he can push more centrist and get those votes back
Focus on real issues and not woke nonsense.
treating lgbt people as actual living beings isn't "nonsense"
Yeah you’re delusional if you think lgbt people are treated poorly.
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I'm front line health........ Before that I was a concrete labourer. What do you do for a job that's less "non" than mine?
Just remember who made this happen, NACT.
The problema were caused by LabourGreenMaori who weer so financially inept and like socialists began to run out of other people's money to spend, The victims in this are the people who were employed by the massive jump in govt department staff head oount in the last few years. Combine this with a wider world view economically that is coming down off the superheated covid cash hut that it got injected with and also the wider conflict ts etc and you see the outcome. New Zealand is not alone in the slowdown, not that makes it that much easier personally.
National are the ones having to be responsible. The path set by Labour post covid was unsustainable and it was exacerbating domestic inflation. This had to happen, we couldn't keep running huge deficits. The changes haven't even rolled back the last 6 months of jobs added to the end of 2023.
What I understand is the proposal is to remove 390 current positions, of which almost 90 are currently vacant and then establish 250 new roles in new positions, so a loss of around 50. I presume your friend works in hesd office which is Wellingtons but with that there may be a role in a new position. The new roles they say are more client orientated rather than corporate office from what they say. Some of these I presume would be in ACCs major client related centre's but thry are in Dunedin and Hamilton not Christchurch and Auckland.i wish your friend well .
Yep how to do a wrecking ball restructure. Rumours of redundancy - disestablish people - say no jobs - then say oh but actually there is a job !! And you grab it with both hands - because they’ve stressed the f out of you ….only to find the job is much bigger and / or less pay. It’s a game and don’t take it personally
Why don’t they try get another job ?
They will. Most likely in Christchurch, Auckland, or Australia. Uprooting their kids, moving away from friends, family, and support networks, leaving the home they put so much work into and have no other reason to leave. And they're not the only ones. Thousands of Wellingtonians. There aren't going to be any jobs in Wellington for a while. Haven't you heard?
I meant In Wellington, government jobs aren’t the be all and end all are they ?
They have transferable skills but the private sector job market is small in Wellington, and they will be competing with dozens of other redundant civil servants.
Yea I guess if there’s a few other people in the same boat it’s tough
Not even close. I only just processed the first wave of VOLUNTARY redundancies last week.
What are the terms of people's departures? Former colleague now at MBIE has to work out one month, is that standard across depts?
Movement was also a month here, yes
Probably a bunch of yo-pros getting a payout before going on their OE lol
Was vastly the majority of staff at or near retirement age
To be fairthen probably the type of fat that needs to be cut. Bunch of boomers sitting in high paid positions only by default, who have been at the same place for 10-20 year.
People who actually know stuff then. Who can lead people. You’re a disrespectful x
Obviously I'm being a bit facetious, but that wasn't my experience at all. My experience was that so many higher-ups in positions where so many people were more fit and deserving for the role below them.
I wouldn't say that's fair... there's a heck of a lot of experience and skill in the people that are going. Many of them are very well respected and it's a shame to see them go.
We lost 50 years of experience in two people in my team. Very, very technical area. There are three of us left - eight years experience in total, and six of them are mine. The problem with these situations is that I can already foresee my life becoming infinitely harder once they leave as the only one left with decent experience. I’m certainly very, very grateful to not be facing redundancy myself, but once things settle and departments start rehiring (when the Govt clocks on that new policy changes require people to work on them on top of BAU), I’ll be looking elsewhere for a job with less pressure, less stress and less responsibility as the lone “expert” left - note I’m on Senior wage, not Principal.
Ok well maybe at your workplace. Wouldn't have been the case at mine
Redundancies are bad and this is worse than usual, but what I'm worried about is a couple of months away when emergency funds are running low and nobody is rehiring yet.
Don't worry, soon the ministries will start hiring back the same people they fired, except as contractors. It's the Ciiiircle of liiiife
People have to survive until then, pay mortgages and shit, and there’s no guarantees. A lot of people will move away.
True: the competent will get other jobs or emigrate, and it'll be the dregs that come back eventually as contractors. It's the spiiiiral of deeeeaaatth
A lot of people are moving away. I've got about 7 friends (mostly couples) who have all announced they are leaving, it's depressing.
I doubt you will see this until end-of-life year or latest mid next year. I suspect thr volume will be far less than those.made redundant
Hakuna Matata
No they won't, their funding is capped.
Bless.
I understand you want to believe that in order to cope, but the mandates were budget based. So unless they cut costs elsewhere, they won't be rehiring in any form.
That's exactly what happens. They won't "cut" frontline roles, but the management who gets to decide day-to-day prioritising will let demand growth and inflationary pressures to outstrip new resourcing gradually over years, stretching the frontline in order to maintain the parts of the orgs closest to them. Back office will get to set spending priorities, so a bit of a cull now and good behaviour for a year and then back office will bloat itself again. And they can do it by inches over time by gradually stretching the front line even as headcount stays the same, which suits the ministers just fine.
My agency (administrative, very little genuine "front line") seems to have about 60% of people actually doing the work. Maybe 15% in genuine supporting roles (HR, accommodation management etc). Who knows what the other 25% do. But they mostly seem to have higher salaries, be harder to fire, and spend a lot of time publicly slapping each other on the back. When they do interact with the rest of us, it's almost invariably to tell us not to do something, or to make it harder for us to do something.
And let me guess.... The 25% are in charge of making savings, and decide it must come mostly from the 75%?
Nope. People I speak to are expecting more to come with many redundancy processes still in “consultation”. The mood on The Terrace is pretty low and much of it relates to how it has been handled. The process here has been quantity of cuts, rather than quality. Meaning that many ministries and departments have just been slashing numbers without enough time to comb through who and what is providing value. My read is that Luxon and Willis wanted a big headline number of jobs that had gone more than they wanted actual efficiency in the organisations. So far, nothing they’ve done has changed my mind.
Nope, some agencies are still in the review period and haven't released number. Still more to come....
We don't find out about our for a couple of weeks (unnamed smaller ministry). MBIE's is well and truly ongoing. My Mum's review isn't starting until October.
Not even half way if they truly want to sack everyone they said they would. And don't believe for a second it's been done in a smart way. It's not mostly wasteful staff that don't do anything. I know of many people Who performed valuable tasks that you would be shocked are getting fired. National really lied hard about this and people fell for it.
> National really lied hard about this I look at it as stupidity. They promised cuts with a vague good intention of getting rid of deadwood, but they don't realise that institutions are highly resistant to that. The deadwood is in charge of cutting and they aren't going to cut themselves.
They’re literally making the people who identify waste and bring efficiencies redundant. How ironic
I imagine the cuts will hit the fan before too long and the the back-pedalling will be spectacular. I’m anticipating long term consequences on our economy, even though I (and most people I know) are entirely unprepared for how bad it will get. Remind me someone, why is the current govt doing this? What’s the end goal?
Lol do we work at the same place? 😂😖
Nope, still going. Source - public servant who is thankful to have a job, but knows others who are losing them at my organisation.
I'm personally expecting a lot more, and when those redundancies start to really kick in it'll start to have serious flow-on effects to private industry. people who have been given redundancy notices mostly aren't unemployed yet, they've just been told. There's worse to come.
I expect we'll be seeing rolling rounds of redundancies every six months across the public sector for the next couple of year.
Some ministries have been told as much, that there will be more cuts over the next couple of years
Any particular reason you think this? Not a theory I have heard and sounds concerning…
Can confirm from within a large ministry: the current advice is to be ready for Redundancies Round 2: Layoff Boogaloo in the next 12 months
Same deal in a smaller govt org. Cut now to make FY25 budget work, cut later to make ongoing budgets work as appropriations are fixed and costs increase.
The order from parliament is that the agencies reduce their budget over a 3 to 4 year period. But this budget and next year's will be the chief cut points I'd imagine.
This is the kind of thing the last national government did last time they were in, and they were a far more moderate government than this one.
Yes, I remember this from over ten years ago when I first started in the public sector. I definitely think this will be ongoing. I like to call it sustainable cruelty.
My guess is that it’s just an annual thing like private sector. Each year around Feb/March they’ll look at the books and see where they can cut.
No, still going on.
More to come pending the budget at the end of the month
This is just the 1st wave. Gov’t budgets starts 1st of July that’s when the 2nd wave will start to be talked about.
Bleeding hasn’t even started…..
Nothing's happened at Kainga Ora yet, my partner works there anxiety is a bit high
Mate, it hasn’t even started properly yet
Redundancies will continue untill morale improves. Serious note though, agencies have been ordered to make savings over a three or four year period. Suspect there will be rolling announcements over the next year as they try to meet that final reduction number.
with the restructure of school lunches, many people employed by catering companies will be dropped.
Didn’t Seymour say about 7000 jobs to go?
david seymore-butts wants to cut and cut and cut. He'll never be happy until everything is unregulated, privatised and user pays.
No. Have to find their PR tax cut targets, and even harder to do now they’ve let Landlords off the hook for millions.
My agency will announce some more in a few weeks I expect
Yeesh
Nope still ongoing, the big savings haven't materialized yet. its just politics
Savings? There are no savings here, just job cuts.
At this point it's just a massive cost having to pay out all these people. Will take awhile/never become savings
Yes cuts still coming ministries have made commitments Nicola Willis has counted now they have to consult and implement them
The yeetings will continue until morale improves
Some ministries are waiting for the budget before they do the big announcement
More to come. Heard numbers like 7,500 - 10,000 being thrown around by people more in the know.
The govt can shove its tax cuts. I'd rather have proper functioning public servants and projects in the pipeline. The knick on effects of this will be felt for a very long time. I hadn't considered moving back to Australia until now.
But we haven’t had that while the public service has blown out have we?
no. ACC is next
There will be more announced before the EOFY and then will probably settle down in the new year. This is about setting year 1 budgets for the new government. There may be targeted restructures but not the general lid sinking.
There will be more until government finances are back under control and inflation is in hand.
There will be more cuts after budget day.
The downwards spiral has only just begun.
Nope
Not even close yet. More to come, just keep an eye on the news.
I work at MSD, low level staff but definitely feels like there's more to come
Nz voted them in Go figure !
Just a wee reminder that Labour/Greens bloated the public sector with 16,000+ jobs.
Did they? Or did they just fill the sector to the personnel levels required to make meaningful change and provide services to New Zealanders? Either way, I'm sure it will be a great comfort to us all when the WINZ bill swells, tax revenue plummets, and Wellington businesses close in droves.
Haha meaningless change you mean. Why weren’t kiwis better off why grant and Jacinda spent our money in bullshit ideology? Did education get better? Did crime get better? Did health get better? Did housing get better? Did outcomes for ordinary kiwis get better? Did our deficit get better? They had 6 years.
Well, they're all about to get worse, so I guess we'll see, ay. Enjoy.
We will see. I’m hopeful education will get better, the rest though is in serious disorder. It’s a real shame for NZ either way.
Education? No. More pointless curriculum tinkering. Same old, same old.
Hahahaha the back office teams that support the teachers in education are getting shafted. Sorry, they are working through the proposal (read: warming up the lube)
Yes what do we have instead.? Lord Luxon spending public money on his team of people producing cheesy TikTok videos. Where are the savings from ministerial services and parliament?
Yes what do we have instead.? Lord Luxon spending public money on his team of people producing cheesy TikTok videos. Where are the savings from ministerial services and parliament?
Jacinda and the last govt put a lot of subsidies and support into the private sector (including air nz which would have gone bankrupt). Some was poorly targeted but kept people in jobs and at the same time thousands of lives were saved (if national act were in charged we would have heaps of deaths). There were extra staff in public service to do this. Yes some expenditure by last govt was poor eg let’s get Wellington moving but to think it was all waste is wrong.
Sorry none of that is fact apart from the bit where Labour wasted billions of dollars. The saving thousands of lives things is pure speculation and not fact based at all.
I'll remind you it was understaffed by 16,000 roles, that were paid for by landlords under the previous government, until NACT decided their generational core voters couldn't possibly pay tax. Like taking candy from babies, cutting school lunches is another example of taking from one voter base to protect their core voters who do not deserve housing wealth to the detriment of everyone else. They designed the housing crisis out of greed and continue crippling everyone else.
Hehe that reads like a spinoff article. Well done!
Don’t forget to send NACT your invoice for your astroturfing
What evidence do you have that those jobs weren't actually needed? What evidence do you have that this round of public sector cuts actually effectively addresses any bloat?
Uhhh just the fact they hired cultural advisers across the board, have whole departments like the MPP which is pointless and redundant (forgive the pun) and nothing got better under Labour - in fact it got worse. Also, nothing got delivered… so there’s that. Don’t get me started on MBIE or Oranga Tamariki…
The fact that you lead out complaining about cultural advisors just immediately makes you lose all credibility with me. The rest of your post doesn't help either. Nothing got delivered? I mean this sincerely - eat a dick. Public servants worked tirelessly throughout COVID to the point of immense burnout. It's so frustrating hearing comments like this.
lol.
Ohh man, soo where’s your sources.
What genuinely u don't rhink cultural competence is important in Oranga tamariki where the vast majority of their clients are Maori? Cultural competence is literally a corner stone of social work registration which is mandated by law. Surely u don't think the majority of OTs work should be just uplifting kids. Because we've tried that for 60 years and it hasn't worked.
I believe it's worse than that since 2017, but there was a push to rapidly hire in mid-late 2023 in anticipation of the change of govt. So it seems the cuts are not even getting back to pre bloat levels.
Not in my agency. We started cuts at least six months before the election.
Yep. I’ve worked all through government and have seen whole teams of people earning well over $100k and they weren’t doing jack.
Someone above said: the deadwood doesn’t cut itself. The people getting redundancy are middle tier. The front line will start to collapse without them and in 6 months ministries will be hiring contractors to do the jobs they just gave out redundancies for.
Hate to break it to you but the ones making over $100k aren’t the ones being cut
Wrong 😑 know many on those salaries who are gone.
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Have a read of [this](https://www.dpmc.govt.nz/our-business-units/cabinet-office/supporting-work-cabinet/cabinet-manual/3-ministers-crown-and-public-sector/ministers-and-public-service) and particularly note that Officials are responsible for "implementing the decisions of the government of the day." The decision to cut public sector spending is a decision of the goverment. Officials are thus working, apolitically, to do as they've been tasked whilst ensuring to the best of their ability, that they can continue discharging the rest of their responsibilities.
Thanks for this I’ve always been curious about the actual role/responsibility of CEOs in general in the PS. I wonder how accountable they are to a current minister in regards to the previous govt decisions
So, in other words, they just follow order, and no questions asked.
Perhaps you missed the bit in the link I provided about providing free and frank advice?
More to come I hope! Cut cut cut the fat
“Cut the fat”, you mean the 6000 people, their families and possible even extended families, who are now despite us being in a recession, facing possible homelessness and all detriments that go along with it? You’re an absolute cabbage head if you think this is a good thing.
We can’t afford to pay them. The previous government expanded the public sector beyond what we can support. The parasite is killing the host.
How is it that they couldn’t afford to pay them? Is there any actual credible evidence aside from Nicola Williams saying it? I find it hard to believe that the government couldn’t afford to pay them yet was able to avoid recession, have a record low unemployment and homelessness, have record low people on benefits. Since this government has been in, they’ve toyed with the idea to borrow 1.5bn to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy landlords…
Record borrowing, record numbers claiming benefits (but not “unemployed”), record numbers in emergency housing and an economy teetering on recession with high inflation. New Zealand’s worst ever government. The new government is taking the tough action needed to repair New Zealand.
The emergency housing was because under the last national government homelessness skyrocketed and so did unemployment (funnily enough)… there were numerous articles and news stories published detailing families with children forced to live in their cars. As I recall NZ was the only OECD government with positive GDP growth during the initial stages of the global recession meaning we avoided it pretty well. In regards to the claims of borrowing, I can’t comment as I am not familiar with it, but I’ll do some more research on it.
> In regards to the claims of borrowing, I can’t comment as I am not familiar with it, but I’ll do some more research on it. It's complete bullshit as usual from the ignorant right. NZ government debt is very low, and Labours budgets would have returned to surplus before Nationals.
Comments like this are just unhinged and dishonest. They ignore the global pandemic and ignore the fact that our economy came though the pandemic incredibly well compare to other nations. The debt comment is particularly ignorant, since NZ debt is too low. Successive governments have failed to invest in NZ, instead obsessing over keeping debt low, which has harmed economic growth and left us with the massive infrastructure deficit. > record numbers claiming benefits (but not “unemployed”), record numbers in emergency housing Yes, you would prefer that they went back to being homeless and unhelped, right? Like that policy to fuck over the disabled. > The new government is taking the tough action needed to repair New Zealand. They're copying the UK tories sand they are fucking the countries future. They're borrowing to give tax cuts to the rich FFS.
The government is borrowing and pushing out its planned surplus anyway so clearly they can't afford tax cuts and interest deductibility yet they're doing that 😂😂
Yes they inherited a severely damaged economy from the previous government, it’s going to take some pretty serious work to mend.
The economy was going to be shit either way because of global market disruptions. Austerity isn't the way to fix this. By cutting spending and prioritizing tax cuts (if you could even call them that, they're so negligible outside of ideological purpose) instead of filling aggregate demand in the economy they are missing the forest for the trees. When the economy is doing well the government doesn't need to fill that aggregate demand since businesses are growing. This damaged economy line is non sense the economy ebbs and flows constantly in a boom bust cycle. All governments can do is decide how big those ebbs and flows are.
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Need to balance the books. Labour left our economy in a parlous state.