There has been a lot of brain drain from the civil service due to government’s poor pay structure in the past says Economy Minister, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum.

Sayed-Khaiyum says this was the findings of a survey that was conducted to determine the base salary of civil service in comparison to the private sector.

“In the private sector after a few years it was very easy to climb up with big increments – whereas in the Government as the higher you got your salary structure compared to the private sector actually went lower.”

Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says this cost the government some really good employees in different areas of proficiency.

“After a few years of experience they go to these overseas conferences, they get all these training – Government invest a lot of money in them and then they get pouched by the Private Sector or multilateral agency. Also in Government they are very much driven by title. So people like the idea of titles this is an administrative officer, senior administrative officer, principle administrative officer and the next level up.”

However, the Fiji Commerce and Employers Federation, Chief Executive, Nesbitt Hazelman says the government is still leading in some areas.

“For instance Government starts their salary just over ten thousand dollars – that’s there minimum starting rate. We pay a little lower than that. I think our starting rate in the private sector about 7,500. So at the lower ends I think the Government is way ahead of us but the in the professional levels, private sectors philosophy – we pay to get the best.”

The salary structure for civil service has now been changed whereby regular assessment are undertaken to allow those working in the public service to get increments based on their performances.