View Document - Parliament of South Africa

1369 FRIDAY, 14 NOVEMBER 2008
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In 2006 the department conducted a Personnel
Expenditure Review which evaluated the
effectiveness of government’s remuneration
expenditure and identified where the challenges
lay. The study found that remuneration
for professionals at entry level was
competitive with the private sector, but once
they had gained some years of experience it
was no longer competitive, and many professionals
were leaving the public service
after a number of years, having been trained
and gained experience in the public service.
To ensure the retention of professionals in
the public service, the Occupation-Specific
Dispensations were devised, which placed
professionals in critical occupation on occupation-specific
remuneration frameworks
and arrangements for grade progression and
career paths.
Implementation has been phased, with
nurses, school-based educators and legallyqualified
personnel being prioritised. Implementation
for nurses and school-based
educators has been completed, while a shortage
of funds is delaying implementation in
the Justice sector. The dispensation for
social workers is currently being negotiated.
Technical work has been completed for
medical specialists and Correctional Services
employees. A task team has been
established for engineers, architects, environmentalists
and other identified professionals.
The OSDs are developmental
because they assist the public service in
attracting and retaining highly skilled professional
staff and boost the capacity of the
state to deliver on government’s socioeconomic
objectives, in the same way that
the flexible remuneration framework for
senior managers and middle managers, introduced
in 2001 and 2004, were intended to
attract and retain high calibre managers.
Policy on Incapacity Leave and Ill-health
Retirements (PILIR)
The intention of PILIR is to curb abuse of
incapacity leave and ill-health retirements
by appointing a Health Risk Manager for all
departments who will scrutinise applications
and advise the Head of Department. Extensive
actuarial research was conducted before
the pilot was approved. In the pilot, incapacity
leave and ill-health retirements reduced
by more than 50%. Following the pilot, the
dpsa co-ordinated the roll-out of PILIR to all
departments. Currently preparations are being
made to decentralise PILIR. A tender is
being issued for the provision of Health Risk
Management services, and departments will
be able to select from an approved panel of
service providers. PILIR is developmental
because it boosts the capacity of the public
service by reducing wastage of human and
financial resources and providing departments
with optimal advice on incapacity
leave and ill-health retirements.
Human Resource Development Strategic
Framework
The Human Resource Development Strategic
Framework (HRDSF) for the Public
Service (Vision 2015) was approved by
Cabinet in December 2007. Its development
was based on a review of the Human
Resource Development Strategy for the Public
Service (2002-06) between November
2006 and June 2007. A stakeholder review
process was undertaken through a series of
nine regional workshops and one national
workshop as well as a workshop for
organised labour under the auspices of the
PSCBC. In addition, 39 individual interviews
of key policy actors in HRD were
conducted, making the sum total of 272
respondents. Flowing out of this a new
HRDSF was developed.
The objectives of the HRDSF are: to promote
and support the National Skills Development
agenda, including ASGI-SA
objectives and JIPSA initiatives; to address
the national skills challenges at all public
sector delivery points in line with the National
HRD Strategy; align all public service
HRD strategies with sectoral and provincial
economic and development growth needs; to
ensure a continuous supply of public sector