Finalizing direction for radical reform of civil servant and public employee salaries from 2018?

The draft project on reforming salary policy for cadres, civil servants, public employees, armed forces and workers in enterprises, developed by the Ministry of Home Affairs, is scheduled to be submitted to the Party Central Committee for consideration at the 7th Conference scheduled to take place in April next year.

Signing a report on the implementation of the National Assembly's resolution on questioning and answering questions at the 2nd National Assembly session (taking place at the end of 2016), Deputy Minister of Home Affairs Nguyen Trong Thua informed about the progress of the project to reform salaries and payrolls of civil servants and public employees.

The leader of the Ministry of Home Affairs emphasized that salary is always an area of ​​interest to National Assembly deputies. On its part, the Ministry has carried out 3 tasks: Submitting to the Prime Minister for promulgation a decision on the establishment of the Central Steering Committee on salary policy reform, social insurance and preferential treatment for meritorious people; Submitting to Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue - Head of the Central Steering Committee on salary policy reform, social insurance and preferential treatment for meritorious people to issue Decision No. 15 with the working regulations of the Steering Committee and coordinating with member agencies of the State Salary Steering Committee to develop a draft project on salary policy reform for cadres, civil servants, public employees, armed forces and employees in enterprises to submit to the 7th Central Conference (April 2018) for consideration.

The basic solution to solve the problem of salary reform for civil servants and public employees is to streamline the payroll and reduce the apparatus.

Streamlining staff is difficult to achieve the target

Regarding the results of the project to streamline the payroll associated with restructuring the organizational apparatus and the team of civil servants and public employees, the report of the Ministry of Home Affairs said that in 2016, the total number of subjects resolved to streamline the payroll was more than 11,900 people. Of which, nearly 10,400 people enjoyed the policy of retiring early, more than 1,500 people enjoyed the policy of quitting immediately, 14 people enjoyed the policy of quitting after going to school, and 16 people enjoyed the policy of transferring to organizations that do not receive salaries from the state budget. In the first 6 months of 2017, the total number of subjects resolved to streamline the payroll was more than 5,000 people.

Deputy Minister Nguyen Trong Thua affirmed that the implementation of staff streamlining ensures the stability of ideology among cadres, civil servants, and public employees, including those who are subject to downsizing. Through the synchronous, public, transparent, democratic, and fair implementation, along with reasonable support policies, it has encouraged and created conditions for those who are downsized after retiring to feel comfortable in their ideology and have an additional amount of money to ensure a stable life.

The general limitation is that, up to now, many ministries, branches and localities have not approved the project to streamline the payroll until 2021 and have not developed a plan to streamline the payroll of their ministries, branches and localities from 2015 - 2021 and each year, leading to the situation of proposing to resolve the payroll streamlining policy not according to regulations (periodically twice a year - every 6 months).

"With the current progress and approach, it is difficult to achieve the goals of Resolution No. 39-NQ/TW of the Politburo" - the most general conclusion.

Regulations on handling retirees: Seeking opinions

Regarding the results of research and amendment of legal documents, Deputy Minister Nguyen Trong Thua informed that, up to now, the Ministry of Home Affairs has submitted to the Government Party Committee on administrative disciplinary action against retired officials and civil servants, especially administrative disciplinary action against Mr. Vu Huy Hoang in accordance with the direction of the Secretariat and legal regulations.

At the same time, the Ministry of Home Affairs also proposed that the National Assembly Standing Committee issue a resolution regulating administrative disciplinary action against retired officials and civil servants, creating a synchronous legal basis for fair and strict handling of violations by officials and civil servants.

Deputy Minister Thua reiterated that the National Assembly Standing Committee has issued a document assigning the Government to draft a resolution on the above content. The Government has assigned the Ministry of Home Affairs to establish a drafting committee and an editorial team to draft the Resolution. Currently, the draft resolution is being sent to ministries, branches and localities for comments.

In addition, another reported content is that the Ministry of Home Affairs is coordinating with ministries, branches and localities to review current documents regulating personnel work, especially on the contents of decentralization, planning; standards and conditions for appointment of cadres, civil servants and management officials to amend and supplement regulations accordingly to ensure the principles of equality, comprehensiveness and connectivity between agencies in the political system.

The general view is to strictly handle cases of degradation, "self-evolution", "self-transformation", failure to ensure standards, conditions, appointment procedures, low capacity and work efficiency, cliques, interests, and localism.

According to Dan Tri