Review single spine salary – BIA tells government
The Bureau for Internal Affairs (BIA), an anti-corruption organisation, has called on the government to throw its searchlight on the broad direction of the Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS) to ensure its sustainability.
The Bureau said Ghana’s labour history since independence has counted a myriad salary review commissions and each failed one after the other, hence the need for government to address the failures of past salary regimes to get a sustainable salary structure and why the SSSS must survive the obvious common cause of failure.
A statement issued by the BIA in Accra on Thursday and copied to Ghana News Agency in Accra said, government must take a very critical look at the objective and systematic job evaluation and how it can empirically measure as permanent labour practice.
It said consultancy so far provided has not established any laid down procedure for a classical production floor evaluation of output throughout the entire labour history of the public sector.
The Bureau therefore called for a thorough procedure for an enduring salary regime that must be reviewed only incrementally and not in one jolt as being decried by government over the Single Spine public wage bill bloat.
“The Bureau suggests and offers a metered productivity conduit, within the public sector to match salary demand with conscious productivity level.
“By this method an elaborate tracking of productivity is established by practice making public sector workers and the members of the public mutual beneficiaries of productivity driven public sector pay policy.
“Premium reliance on mere market premium and factors outside the control of public sector will spell the same doom for the SSSS scheme,” the statement said.
BIA calls for a thorough social, political and economic package to establish a system that will motivate the public sector to give back productivity and using that as the basis to determine realistic wage level.
“We will continue to grope in the dark over sustainable public sector wage bill if we hasten to adopt spurious methods.”
The statement said a close look at previous salary reviews only focused on satisfying public sector workers expectation without adequate measure of ensuring satisfactory service delivery to the public in appropriate productivity.
It said: “Sticking to our old ways and using market premium will heighten labour rumblings and send the present SSSS to the gallows as its predecessors.
“Pursuit of market premium mirage shall be for eternity whilst we nurture the impossible wishful thinking to sustain single spine illusions without direct and reliable foundation of labour output tracking and valuation.”
The statement said many organisations should develop into weaned state corporations capable of standing on their own by improved output culture.
BIA is a centre for information gathering of public concerns with the aim of bridging the communication gap between the public and the authorities on issues negatively affecting the nation.
Source: GNA