Derek Twigg, Under-Secretary of State for Defence has been obliged to reveal that Ministry of Defence staff are set to share out amongst themselves a total £41.3 million in "appraisal-related annual bonus payments" this year.186 senior civil servants are to receive £7,127 each, a total of £1.3 million. These are the civil servants........
- who only four months ago were severly criticised for allowing procurement costs to overrun this year by £2.6 billion and projects to be a total of 36 years behind schedule;
- whose incompetence and mismanagement have permitted the personal details of 600,000 people to fall into the hands of crooks;
- who are delaying the awarding of medals to the dead and wounded;
- who are running a department which allows equipment shortages to cost the lives of soldiers on the frontline, allows barracks to fall into a state of disrepair and incorrectly pays 50,000 troops;
- In short, the same civil servants who are presiding over a department in chaos.
Oh and let's not forget the 17 special "fixed term appointees" to the MoD who are going to be lining their pockets with bonuses of £22,000 each.
The bulk of the money will be dished out to office staff "to reward excellent performance and achievement". If last year is anything to go by, bonuses will be given to over half the MoD staff (in 2006/07 51% of staff received a bonus). The MoD is indeed fortunate to have such a high proportion of its staff delivering such "excellent" service.
Last year MoD staff received bonuses totaling £39 million. So this year they'll be getting an additional bonus on their bonuses of £2.3 million; that's an inflation-busting increase of 5.9%!
Contrast this with soldiers risking their lives on the frontline everyday and receiving a daily operational bonus of £12 for it (and a salary of just £15,000 per year).
Yeah....... the civil servants really deserve their bonuses.
Link> The Sun: £1.3m for the MoD Scrooges
Link> The Herald: MoD staff to share £41m in bonuses
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