Pulu 'Anau's made another succint, keep your eyes on the ball, comment around this strike. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tonga/message/8516

Dodgy, you hit the thing right on the head. Will there be better service from the public service? One would hope so, but of course other than these vague requests for more money, it doesn' t seem like the PSA offers anything other than promising to go back to work and stop whining.

While the news from Tonga is tragically poor on details for those of us outside of the country, I' m betting that a lot of the hinted split in the Chamber of Commerce over the strike comes from details like this. I think the PSA also has a lot less support than they believe, I know even now outside of the country I' m not stating my opinions nearly as strong as I would like to& I honestly worry about the safety of my wife' s relatives over there should I speak up too loudly. If I was still there, (unlike you, sir, I left Tonga very recently, only about 2 days after the strike started), I would worry about my future business interests because like most businesses in Tonga we were quite reliant on Government contracts, and have had quite some experience with grudges and future work.

All the PSA is doing is whining. I' ll state it straight out: I' m one of those guys that did work for the government and got paid nearly $100/hr for doing it. Or at least my company did. But as I rushed in to the next "emergency" to see people sitting around playing cards on work time, chatting on MSN, or was actually CALLED AND PAID IN GOVERNMENT FUNDS TO REPAIR PERSONAL MATTERS FOR GOVT. STAFF, I kinda understood what came with the low pay. Low quality service, low dedication, and almost no concern for the public. Obviously that' s not everybody. Just like in the churches there are some that are completely dedicated to the "cause", sometimes almost tragically so. But they are a very small minority.

Here' s some suggestions for the PSA to include on their next set of demands:

* That within one month of returning to work the PSA will at it' s own expense create and provide a detailed job descriptions and performance metrics for every single position in the government. The PSC will "audit" and improve these descriptions and metrics to make them more realistic.

* That after three months of PSC approval the PSA will at it' s own expense assist and train those staff that have failed to meet their performance metrics. For a lot of staff this will probably require things as basic as arithmetic review lessons. For others, it will be just some strong talk from their "union" about their laziness.

* That after 6 months the PSC will at it' s own discretion remove those positions or employees that do not meet the metrics as agreed upon with the PSA. The PSC will at it' s own discretion decide whether such positions need to be filled again. (Honestly, if this did work out, there would be a lot less need of employees in government service)

* All members of the PSA to agree on condition of termination that Government resources including computers, office supplies, telephones, electricity, etc will never be used again by employees for any non-work reason on a zero tolerance policy. I think there' d be a lot more work done if this was true. Any of you that get the forwarded powerpoint presentations in your email know how often they come from government employees.

* That a list of trades and industries be compiled (this likely already exists). That from this list every PSA employee will know what trades their department of government either regulates or would be reasonably be expected to do business with. That government employees would be barred from owning, working for, or having a close relative (spouse/brother-sister/parent) own any company that does similar work.

* That government employees would be similarly barred for *ANY* company that would expect or does in fact receive more than $5,000 in government contracts in a year. Obviously these two points might not need to apply to all employees, perhaps only to those over a certain level. My suggestion would be level 9 or lower.

* That the PSA request from the NZ government a grant to create a basic skills competency test, similar to what would be expected of any student that' s finished form 7. That this test be given to all teachers in the government education system. That teachers failing this test be given 3 months to improve before being tested again, and failing that be suspended for 3 months before being tested again, and failing that be removed from government service.

* That teachers and ALL STAFF in all government high schools will follow the same English only policy that they supposedly force on the students, on pain of termination.

* That the PSA will lobby the parliament to make it a criminal offense to hinder the education of a student through negligence. There have been instances (and I won' t point fingers) where students have not passed form 5 or 6 because either their teachers didn' t do their jobs with regards to giving them proper tests for their external requirements, or the administration staff of a school didn' t submit the paperwork.

* That teachers and ALL STAFF found to be cheating in any manner ("helping" your cousin by writing their essay for USP is cheating, sorry) be immediately terminated.

The PSA can put that in their pipe and smoke it. As for me, if they offered to do these things, I' d be out there marching with them for a 100% pay increase across the board. We could call it 100/50/05, 100% increase, with 50% fired for 2005! The perfect solution.

Anyone else have some more? Is the PSA offering to do anything at all besides go back to work?

Pulu Anau

email address: pulu@afe.to

Wow, accountability!!! Who'd-a-thought?

Of course part of the responsibilities for some of the things highlighted by Pulu are the responsibility of some of the people currently on strike.

Why are the low-paid staff playing cards during working hours? Oh, the boss has gone to 'uta and isn't back for another two hours ? They spent the week-end hua his ma'alaa? They spent last night at the 'aa poo funeral?

It would be in the best interests of striking employees and their families for a more efficient public service, but are we willing to actually work on fixing the whole thing, or only the bits that concern us at the moment?

It reminds me of when Daniel Petre began working with us as our new General Manager. One of the 1st things he emphasised was if the phone rings, the nearest person to the phone is responsible for it, answer it. If you're across the floor and the phone rings, get across the building and answer it. If you can't dedicate yourself to be proactive to the customers who can be easily ignored, what value are you to the organisation?