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Civil servants doing union work cost taxpayers £36m a year

July 4th, 2012 FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

By
Tim Shipman


PUBLISHED:

19:40 EST, 3 July 2012

|

UPDATED:

19:40 EST, 3 July 2012

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude wants to slash the number of union reps funded by the taxpayer

Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude wants to slash the number of union reps funded by the taxpayer

Taxpayers are forking out £36million a year to fund the trade union activities of thousands of civil servants, according to research.

More than 6,800 public sector staff are paid with public money to do some union work rather than their day jobs.

A Cabinet Office study which lays bare the scale of the spending has revealed that nearly 250 union reps have their entire salary paid from the public purse.

Ministers will next week announce plans to slash the number of union reps funded by the taxpayer in order to save money and reduce the grip of the unions on the Civil Service.

Previously, Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude has said that around 150 civil servants spend 100 per cent of their paid time on union business.

But the government inquiry has found that the true number is much higher. So far, 248 have been identified.

The £36million bill to the taxpayer of paid union work is the equivalent of the salary of more than 900 nurses or the cost of more than 10,000 primary school places.

These numbers emerged from a cross-government exercise to map the extent of facility time – paid time off for union work.

Mr Maude will publish a consultation next week which will outline plans to cut the bill.

Whitehall departments will be told to reduce the number of staff who are paid for union work.

Like all employers, Civil Service bosses have to offer some paid time off to union reps but Mr Maude wants to cut the number of hours so public sector employees are no better off than their counterparts in the private sector.

Mr Maude also wants a small number of union reps who work full time for a union for a fixed period of a year ‘where we can keep an eye on them’ rather than thousands doing a few hours here and there, which would be harder to monitor.

Whitehall departments are being told to reduce the number of staff who are paid for union work

Whitehall departments are being told to reduce the number of staff who are paid for union work

Unions insist that ‘facility time’ saves far more money than it costs because union representatives help to resolve worker disputes before they escalate.

But Mr Maude has long targeted the influence of unions over civil servants.

A Whitehall source said: ‘It’s simply wrong that taxpayers are paying civil servants to spend years doing nothing but union activity instead of the jobs they are supposed to do.

‘Francis Maude demanded that departments collect accurate information on the numbers and costs of taxpayer-funded trade union reps.

‘This information was never available before and, unsurprisingly, initial estimates understated the case. No doubt Labour didn’t want to antagonise their union paymasters by monitoring union activity properly.’

Parliamentary answers have revealed that the Ministry of Defence has 66 full-time union reps and the Ministry of Justice has 67.

A report last year by the TaxPayers’ Alliance campaign group showed that £11million was spent by the NHS on funding trade union reps and a further £1 million by fire services.

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How many people in the Civil Service are working via agencies on minimum wage and most of them graduates, accruing no pension ?
The Unions can’t do enough to stop this abuse.

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Cumbria County Council CEO even wrote a letter in one of the local rags justifying this and why it should continue, whilst cutting services for the elderly! I know, because it was in response to my open letter.

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Don’t forget the Association of Chief Police Officers which is set up as a private company funded by the Home Office ie the taxpayer.

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