Government needs to crack down on sickies, says CBI

12 May 05
The new Labour government needs to get a grip on spiralling public sector absence rates, which cost the economy more than £4bn last year, business leaders have urged.

13 May 2005

The new Labour government needs to get a grip on spiralling public sector absence rates, which cost the economy more than £4bn last year, business leaders have urged.

The CBI's latest survey showed that in 2004 public sector employees were absent for an average of 9.1 days in 2004, compared with 6.4 days for their private sector counterparts. The 2.7-day difference is an increase on the two-day gap between the sectors exposed in the 2003 survey.

The CBI claimed that if the public sector could reduce its absence rates to private sector levels, absence would fall by more than 20 million days and save the taxpayer some £1.2bn - enough to pay the salaries of 37,000 new teachers.

CBI director general Sir Digby Jones said: 'These findings will make worrying reading for the newly elected government. If ministers fail to deal with this problem, poorer frontline services or higher taxes will be the result. This problem is undermining promised public sector efficiency gains.'

He singled out the Department for Work and Pensions as one of the worst performers.

But civil service unions called on the CBI to stop 'finger pointing' in an attempt to score 'cheap points'.

Public and Commercial Services union general secretary Mark Serwotka said: 'The CBI shows a complete lack of understanding of the public sector and the challenges facing thousands of civil and public servants.

'Far from showing that public servants are workshy, what these figures show is that civil and public servants are working in increasingly low-paid stressful conditions against the backdrop of not knowing whether they will have a job next year.'

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