PUTRAJAYA should rightsize the civil service, said Mohd Sheriff Mohd Kassim, as the amount spent on salaries and emoluments is not sustainable in the long run.

The former Khazanah Nasional Bhd managing director’s comments come after Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said a big chunk of the government’s operating expenditure goes towards wages and pensions for civil servants.

“The way it (civil service) is growing, I don’t think it is going to be sustainable,” Sheriff told The Malaysian Insight on the sidelines of the Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute’s Malaysian Strategic Financial Outlook Forum.

He said the government should relook its machinery, and determine where it can cut down or reallocate manpower, and implement automation and technology.

“Those kinds of studies should start now… the government will have to address this, there is no way you can escape it. So, it is better to get prepared… because it has to be done in a way that is fair to civil servants.”

If the government chooses to downsize by way of retrenchment, he said, it should consider offering compensation, such as through the voluntary separation scheme, as practised in the private sector.

During a panel session earlier, Rembau MP Khairy Jamaluddin said it is tough for both the past and present administrations to address the issue of a bloated civil service because it is a huge vote bank.

“No government, whether it is Barisan Nasional or Pakatan Harapan, will seriously look into civil service reforms because, one, for a fact, they are huge vote banks.

“You are talking about civil servants and their families, perhaps, multiplied by three or four. We are talking about easily two to three million people on the government payroll at different levels… so, it is very difficult to look into.”

He added that no in-depth studies have been conducted to determine whether the civil service is indeed bloated.

There are overstaffed areas as well as those that are chronically understaffed, he said.

While redeployment is an option, it will require a gestation period and the reskilling of employees, said Khairy.

“So many things the government does today can be automated, and you have to start investing today in those technologies, so that they can free people up.”

He said civil service reforms are necessary only if they create more room for fiscal spending.

Emoluments are projected to account for 31.6%, or RM82 billion, of the RM260 billion operating expenditure allocation in Budget 2019.

This is difficult to change unless there is long-term action to resize the civil service and reform the pension system, said Khairy. – March 12, 2019.