3 Mar 2006

Tonga's PSA deplores lack of consultation over restructuring plans

4:16 pm on 3 March 2006

The Public Servants Association in Tonga says it should have been consulted about two new models for government restructuring that have been released in the kingdom.

This week the government released models that will cut the number of its departments by half.

Only two weeks of consultation meetings were held over the two proposals because the new structure must be in place by the end of June.

The PSA president, Dr 'Aivi Puloka, says her association were not involved in any meetings and were told by government that they would only get a meeting when they were ready.

Dr Puloka says it was not a satisfactory response.

"PSA should be part of the consultative process, representing a lot of the public servants, so that there is no grievance expressed when they release their finalised decisions and therefore avoid any industrial action by public servants."

Dr Puloka says the PSA has created its own model which it hopes to present to the government soon.