Luxembourg’s public sector paradise

Life is good if you are a Public Servant in Luxembourg. You earn on average more than €100,000 ($A165,000) a year, your working hours and conditions are strictly regulated with little or no chance you will ever be laid off or made redundant.

No wonder it seems everyone wants to get into the bureaucracy and for anyone that wants to try, the way is wide open.

Luxembourg’s Councils have been luring workers from the private sector for years — and now the trend is proving fatal for some private sector companies already struggling under high material costs and slowing demand.

The latest casualty is the Manuel Cardoso construction company which announced it was filing for bankruptcy after its workers complained about outstanding wages.

Private sector lobby group, the Chambre des Métiers, said companies such as Manuel Cardoso had to work profitably in order to survive and could not match the starting salaries being offered by the public sector.  

“There are now more trade industry jobs being created in the public sector than in the private sector,” the lobby group said.

“The public sector has become a major competitor across all trades, poaching workers away from private companies.”

In fact, some 95,000 people work for the Government or in other forms of public administration — one in three of all jobs in the country and almost twice as many as the second biggest employer, financial services.

The ratio of Council jobs per inhabitant is an indication of how huge Luxembourg's public sector is in proportion to its population.

There are more than a dozen municipalities in the country in which there is one Council employee for fewer than every 100 inhabitants.

The Sanem Commune the country’s south-west tops the list for Council staff per number of residents, with one municipal worker for every 44 inhabitants.

 

Speaker ban on Government critics ends

The United Kingdom Government has walked back on a controversial ruling that banned any speaker from events organised by the Civil Service if they had previously criticised Government policy.

The advice, introduced by then Minister for the Cabinet Office, Jacob Rees-Mogg in 2022, resulted in weapons expert Dan Kaszeta barred from addressing a conference organised by the Ministry of Defence due to criticisms he had made of the Government on Twitter.

Last year Kate Devlin, who specialises in artificial intelligence, was ‘disinvited’ from addressing a network of Civil Service officials after her criticism of the Government’s projected roll-out of AI was unearthed.

Before that, Priyamvada Gopal, an expert in post-colonial studies at the University of Cambridge, was stopped from speaking to Home Office officials about her view that the Department’s policies were linked with colonial history when an old social media post critical of then Home Secretary Priti Patel came to light.

Mr Kaszeta (pictured) pushed back at his ban in no uncertain terms, calling it an "outrage against free speech".

He said he was outraged that the Government would trawl through his Twitter account in which he had criticised Brexit and the Government's asylum policy – subjects which had nothing to do with the conference on chemical weapons demilitarisation where he had been named as a guest speaker.

This resulted in a statement from the current Minister for the Cabinet Office, Jeremy Quin who said the guidance had originally been developed to help Civil Servants avoid issuing speaking invitations to "individuals or organisations who have expressed or supported extremist views".

“The aim was to prevent events from taking place which might lead to the impartiality of the Civil Service being called into question or its reputation otherwise brought into disrepute," Mr Quin said.

“However, the guidance is not being used in the way it was originally intended and there is a risk of it being misinterpreted.

 "It is important we protect Civil Service impartiality, but not in a way that could result in adverse unintended consequences."

He said he had decided to withdraw the current guidance, review it and reissue it in later in the year in the hope it would then strike the right balance.

However, the change of heart came too late for the conference, which was held in April, to hear from Mr Kaszeta, an expert on nerve agents who spent 12 years advising the White House on the subject.

 

Long-suffering Remainers need a champion

Summing up his analysis of the latest by-election results in the United Kingdom, Professor of Politics at Strathclyde University, Sir John Curtice made the following observation:

“The coalition of Leave supporters that delivered Boris Johnson his majority in 2019 has collapsed — nearly half are no longer supporting the party, while Brexit itself has lost its allure for some voters.

“The Tory leader [Rishi Sunak] needs to find a new tune for his party, but with living standards falling, the economy faltering, and public services struggling, enticing voters back into the Tory fold still looks far from easy.”

It gives me absolutely no pleasure that what I predicted would happen in 2016 is coming to pass. Leaving the European family was never going to be a good option for a nation where many were still struggling with the transition from Imperial powerhouse to an important, but second-ranked world power.

Within Europe the UK retained a strong voice, a balancing force between Germany and France. Outside it is lost, its influence gone, all but ignored in a world of United States-China rivalries, Asian tiger economies and the rapid advances of new players such as India and Brazil.    

Remainers have long had to endure the taunts of “democracy” over the result of the 2016 referendum which saw 51.9 per cent of voters in favour of leaving the EU, but while it has long been considered that Leave got over the line though a mixture of false promises and misrepresentations over the benefits of Brexit, it is also apparent that the architect of the vote, then Prime Minister David Cameron, never believed it should have been the final say on the outcome.

Asked some time later why he did not insist on a ‘consensus majority’ of 55 or 60 per cent in favour on such a crucial issue, Cameron (pictured) said he had always considered the initial referendum to be advisory only, with the question to be revisited when the terms of leaving became clearer.

Where the former Prime Minister failed – and failed miserably – was in not staying in office to manage the process he had created.

His claim that as a supporter of remaining in the EU, he should step away from the development of a plan he did not agree with, does not stack up.

It should have been clear to him that with a wafer-thin majority in favour of leaving, there needed to be continuing consultation on both sides of the argument for and against Brexit.

Instead he walked away within days of the 2016 result, leaving the Government at the mercy of Brexit fanatics determined to deny the people the opportunity to have second thoughts once the dire consequences of leaving became apparent.

There was still one more chance in the 2019 General Election which opportunist Brixiteer Johnson, now Prime Minister, called with the aim of ‘getting Brexit done’.

Here was the opportunity for the Opposition Labour Party to mount a vigorous campaign in support of a second referendum, challenging the Government to defend Brexit in the light of the changed circumstances that had taken place in the more than three years since the original vote.

Instead, Opposition Leader Jeremy Corbyn, never an EU enthusiast, waffled about re-opening negotiations for a better deal while trying to switch the debate to non-Brexit issues when at the time Brexit was the overwhelming issue on which the election was being fought. It was the equivalent of giving Johnson a free pass.  

As a result the Remain camp, more than 48 per cent of the population, and probably more since the consequences of Brexit were now revealed, was cut adrift with no-one to vote for. The field was left open for Johnson’s crushing victory.

While a General Election does not have to be held again until late next year, the performance of the third party in UK politics, the Liberal Democrats, is beginning to have increasing significance.

Its latest by-election result at Somerton and Frome, where it more than wiped out a 20,000 Government majority, follows equally impressive showings in North Shropshire and Tiverton and Honiton.

The Liberal Democrats have long been the most pro-European Union of all the county’s political institutions, and while the Conservative’s 2019 election win muted its voice, it has begun to cautiously put its toes back into the European waters.

It current policy is to rebuild the trading and social links with the EU which have been damaged by the Brixeteers. It says this will be a lengthy process but states: “Britain’s best future is at the heart of Europe — and our long-term ambition is to see the UK in that place once more.”

Still seen more as a party of protest, its task must be to burnish its European credentials in contrast to a Conservative Government in thrall to hard-line Europhobes and Labour’s acquiescence in what is increasingly seen as the failed Brexit experiment.

Ever since 2016 Remainers have had no place to go – almost half of the population, and maybe many more by now, need a champion.

The Commonwealth Games has run out of road

It is almost a century since athletes gathered in Hamilton, Ontario, for what was then the British Empire Games. In the decades since the world has changed almost beyond recognition, and the Games has battled to change with it.

 New titles, eliminating ‘Empire’ and eventually ‘British’, have taken place; republics that have broken all formal ties with the mother country are still included; even nations that never had links with the United Kingdom get the nod.

However, the changes never seemed to be enough and in the third decade of the 21^st century, it may well be that the Commonwealth Games can no longer reinvent itself into relevance.

One fundamental problem can be seen in the list of the 22 host cities. The Commonwealth is supposed to be an all-embracing family of 53 nations, yet throughout its history the Games has largely been shuffled between the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

Just three countries from outside this elite grouping, Jamaica in far off 1966, Malaysia in 1998 and India (2010) have been chosen as hosts – and most recently the New Delhi Games were dogged by controversy when a number of athletes refused to travel because of what they perceived as security concerns.

An African nation has yet to host a Commonwealth Games – despite Africa being home to almost half the Commonwealth’s total membership.

In other words, there is some justification in the Games being perceived as a white nations’ club, with all the others invited in just to make up the numbers.

Beyond this there is a bigger picture. The world is grappling with multiple crises – the aftermath of a pandemic that has still not totally relaxed its hold; a brutal war in Ukraine that could bring starvation to many nations; conflict in Sudan and elsewhere and above all, a warming world that is moving slowly but relentlessly to the brink of catastrophe.  

These are no longer items on the evening news. They are events which have caused Australia’s cost-of-living crunch and will likely lead to another horrific summer of what the commentators call “extreme weather events”.   

When Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said his State could no longer afford to host the 2026 Commonwealth Games, he was looking at increasingly urgent priorities which, in his view, required his limited funds to be spent elsewhere.

I am sure he took that decision in the full knowledge sport-focused organisations and individuals, both in Australia and overseas, would erupt in outrage, but that the anger falling upon his head must be born.

Sport generally will survive the upheavals we are experiencing, but maybe the concept of a Commonwealth of Nations Games has run out of road.  

Remote work is here — get used to it

Right wing media commentator and former politician Jeff Kennett (those with long memories will remember he was Premier of Victoria for a few years in the last century) surfaced recently with the suggestion that public sector staff who continued to work from home in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic should take a pay cut. 

His rationale is that the home workers saved money on transport costs and had less stress from long commutes, which was unfair on those who had to attend their places of work, such as public healthcare workers and school support staff.

I don’t want to join the storm of ridicule that Kennett (pictured) has provoked by his statements — rightly dismissed as ludicrous by one critic — but I do point out that like so many ex-politicians desperately seeking to retain a public profile, he is espousing views that are simply out of time.

As an example, in his back-to-the-office call he is in sync with another political figure from across the world, United Kingdom Conservative MP and former Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg, who has repeatedly demanded that all UK Civil Servants return to their offices just as if the pandemic had never taken place.

Rees-Mogg, with his Latin quotations, love of the Tridentine Mass and rather quaint way of dressing has been labelled the Minister for the 17^th Century by UK commentators, and it does seems that a revulsion towards anything that is new or innovative is in the DNA of many figures on the right of the political spectrum. 

The advance of technology has long enabled some industries to thrive with workers in place in different parts of the world. Public sectors were making hesitant steps towards remote work before the pandemic and were forced to embrace it when the virus struck.

Despite what many figures on the right claim, productivity did not suffer – in fact there are reputable surveys that suggest it might actually have increased. Staff who found they were easily able to conduct their work from home for two, three or five days a week, will not be easily to be persuaded that they must automatically return to the old ways.

Every major industrial or societal change brings its casualties – the hand weavers of the early 19^th century, often violently opposed the introduction of cotton-spinning technology, or in my own industry when computerisation brought an end to the hot-metal production of newspapers in the last decades of the 20^th.

In the United States whole shopping centres lie abandoned and derelict, victims of the movement towards online purchasing. Sadly the same fate awaits many city centre small business — coffee and sandwich shops — as their office-worker cliental shrinks.

With every change there are opportunities. There are still supermarkets, just fewer and selling more specialised items; the coffee and sandwich bars in the suburbs will enjoy new custom from home workers who still want to spend time away from their computers enjoying their daily brew or quick lunch.

Change happens, and will continue to happen, however much the Kennetts and Rees-Moggs of this world rail against it. The trick is to ride its waves, rather than being left floundering in its shallows.       

 

Keeping the chains on Russia

When the war in Ukraine ends, as wars always do eventually, then the democratic West must come to terms with how they relate to Russia in the months and years that follow.

Whether Moscow wins or loses (and heaven forbid the former) it can never be business as usual. Those who advocate for it, and I am sure there will many whose business interests cross international frontiers, must be firmly rebuffed, at least until the Russian State can demonstrate to the world that blood-hungry demagogues no longer have access to its levers of power.

I am not suggesting that Russia should, or could, reform itself into a liberal democracy. I, and many others, went down that path after the collapse of the Soviet Union when we believed a reformed Russian Federation could be welcomed into the family of European nations — “a ‘Europe’ that stretches from Lisbon to Vladivostok” I so naively wrote at the time.

Russia can never be that, and I should have taken a closer look at its history to realise it. If the savagery of the Tsarist regimes can be excused as being a product of their times, it is harder to dismiss the barbarity of the 20^th century.

From throwing opponents into blast furnaces to starving them in engineered famines, successive Russian governments have been leading exponents of new and creatives ways of inflicting misery on opponents, or those simply deemed unworthy of the life ordered for them.

After decades of relative peace and prosperity, the world got soft on Russia. We welcomed the new man in charge, Vladimir Putin, as being right for the job of converting his country into a functioning democracy and a reliable partner for the West.

We dismissed as alarmist the persistent warnings of critics like Alexander Litvinenko who said Putin’s rise had been over the bodies of his fellow citizens in apartment explosions wrongly attributed to ‘terrorists’ allowing him to play the strongman who would deal with the ‘threat’ once he held power.

We passed off the so-called criminal acts against prominent Putin critics, which the Kremlin always promised to investigate but which somehow never had a satisfactory conclusion.

Even after Litvinenko himself was murdered on British soil by the Kremlin’s hit men, it was years before the UK was finally goaded into conducting an independent and damning inquiry, but by then the genie was out of the bottle.

Attacks on Georgia, the mass bombing of areas in Syria opposed to his crony, Bashar al-Assad, the conversion of Belarus into a client State under the control of his eager ally and fellow dictator, Aleksandr Lukashenko, the annexation of Crimea and support for rebels in eastern Ukraine…all have emboldened Putin to the point where he believed himself omnipotent, his rebuffs to Western protests so transparent as to be farcical.

Crimea’s citizens welcomed a “return to the motherland” in a clearly rigged referendum; Russian soldiers stiffening the rebel rebellion in eastern Ukraine were “volunteers helping out on their holidays”.

Putin’s luck ran out when Ukrainians, who have never
wanted to be part of Russia, taking every opportunity to separate themselves when the opportunities arose down through history, showed they were not going to give up the independence they gained from the break-up of the Soviet Union.

The West cried enough and supplied Kyiv with the means to resist. Putin’s forces are bogged down in a stalemate, lacking the resources (and perhaps the will) to launch a serious offensive with the only option a dogged rear-guard stalling of the Ukrainian advance in the hope that they still hold territory should the West tire of the contest and pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy into a compromise.

Even post-Soviet Union, the Russian Federation is still the largest country in the world occupying more than one-eighth of the world’s inhabited land mass. Much of its hinterland is sparsely populated and under-developed. There are many internal problems that should be occupying the attention of a normal nation.

But Russia is not a normal nation and Putin, obsessed with the impossible dream of restoring Soviet grandeur and a KGB-trained liar, is far from a normal leader. Negotiation with him is impossible.   

The initial task must be to continue to assist in rolling back the land he has hijacked from Ukraine, and then to ensure he understands that while his method of government is a matter for his citizens, he will never, ever again, be allowed to export it beyond his borders.