A4

By STEPHEN LLEWELLYN
llewellyn@dailygleaner.com

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The Liberal government may be willing to sacrifice the provincial civil service on the block of public opinion for the sake of a balanced budget, says a political scientist.

University of New Brunswick's Saint John campus political science Prof. Don Desserud said Monday that the civil service is often a blind spot for governments.

"If it is simply a way of getting around a bottom-line problem very quickly, they are going to be in for a surprise because they are going to be in for a political blow that is not to be sneezed at," he said.

Premier Shawn Graham said last week that 25 per cent of the civil service is expected to retire in the next five years, and that will give the government an opportunity to make the bureaucracy more efficient and operate with fewer bodies.

The government hasn't said how much it would like to see the civil service shrink, but it wouldn't be the entire 25 per cent.

The civil service is a vital part of Fredericton's economy, representing about 6,000 jobs.

"Those are high-paid positions, and they put a lot of money in the local economy," Desserud said.

"There is an economic loss that is severe and serious, and it has to be thought of carefully before actions are taken for political expediency."

Cutting the civil service by attrition would save money, he said, but it doesn't automatically mean the civil service will become more efficient. The end result may be an exhausted, overworked civil service that makes mistakes, Desserud said.

"There is a political fallout because it is true that by definition an awful lot of people who work for the government live in the capital region and will then turn on the government," said Desserud. "To me, it is short-sighted and it undervalues just how important the civil service is.

"That is just a knee-jerk reaction."

He said there never seems to be a comprehensive study that identifies efficiencies that come from a smaller civil service.

Desserud also said that cuts to the civil service usually play well - or at least not negatively - in more rural areas, he said.

"That is the public perception and that is what the government is pandering to," he said.

"If we cut back on the civil service, or at least allow attrition to whittle them down for us, we are not going to pay a (political) price because outside the capital region ... they won't care."

The four local Fredericton Liberals MLAs haven't publicly protested the idea of shrinking the civil service, and Desserud said it's hard to understand why.

"We have no idea what they are saying inside caucus," he said.

"It could be, as you said, it hasn't sunk in ... or they aren't getting any kickback yet ... at their constituency level.

"Or it could be they are playing the team approach that outside of caucus they are not going to say anything negative, but inside they are stamping on the floor and hammering on the tables."