Cost-cuts for civil service union work

Published on 06/09/2012 02:45

MINISTERS have been forced to “tease out” the cost of union activities within the civil service, Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude has claimed.

He said the cost of union time in the civil service had been “allowed to creep up” and now needed to be “rigorously” controlled and monitored.

Speaking during Cabinet Office questions in the Commons, Mr Maude said the cost to the taxpayer of trade union time 
in the civil service was between £33 million and £36m.

He said that before the government set up its investigation into the issue, the monitoring of trade union time in the civil service was “in most cases almost non-existent”.

Mr Maude said: “It has taken a long time, many months, to tease out of Whitehall how much is being spent, how much facilities time there is.

“We estimate the amount of cost to the taxpayer of time to the trade unions, just in the civil service, is between £33m and £36m a year. This is too much, which is why we are consulting about how it can be reduced.”