You’re not dealing with an educated person here….don’t waste your time trying to explain basics to them.

Let’s be honest–the CS are not the bad guys here, they are people, friends, neighbors our community. The issue is that Bermuda cannot afford to continue on this spending trajectory given her precarious financial state of affairs. Its better that provisions are enacted to keep the maximum number of people in financially gaining positions but at a lower rate (pay cuts)to preserve what little financial resources we have–those emergency measures can be reversed when the economy strengthens. We simply can’t afford business as usual.

The private sector has sacrificed, have paid more into taxes, have made emergency donations–all of which the Premier has acknowledged–WHY THEN–has he taken this turn and started with the decisive rhetoric after he and his ministers have stated publicly that its IB that will help Bermuda get through this.

WHY WHY WHY shift the rhetoric to poke at the one pillar that we are all depending on at the moment.

Please Mr. Premier your leadership must be driven on what is required for the good of the country and ALL of her citizens–UNITY. You got this, you may get backlash–but that goes with the leadership territory.

Blessings!

It’s a bit like saying “I was going to buy myself 4 pairs of luxury shoes and a new Iphone, but I didn’t, so I now have $2,500 in savings, which I can spend on something else”. That’s how the PLP thinks about things.

Of course, someone in the public sector, where you think money falls out of the frikin sky, wouldn’t understand this at all.

You will.

Yes people are criticising the Civil Service – why? – because we can’t afford their numbers, we don’t need their numbers and the unions are the real leaders here not the Premier.

Yes I have a problem with that.

““Our public officers have often been scapegoated, abused, and disrespected and portrayed as the source and solution to most of our problems. The Government certainly does not accept that. In fact, we reject that mindset entirely.”

The issue is this, the private sector takes “all the hits”, never goes on strike, doesn’t have seemingly unlimited sick day capability and is always held accountable. That’s the first problem – the CS is apparently immune to outside forces. The CS certainly does not ever sacrifice.

The second issue is this, we are a small island of 60,000. Our CS is over sized for the population it serves – and while I am sure there are plenty of conscientious civil servants, the value we get for OUR money is questionable. Can’t write a bus schedule, can’t collect the trash, don’t deliver the post in the rain, drive buses too fast, crash ferries while “tired and emotional”, don’t even collect taxes consistently (laughable given how broke we are), fail our students consistently and actively work to impede the very business we need to survive through incompetence at the Dept of Immigration. And all of that service is delivered with a tooth-sucking belligerence encouraged by the rhetoric of our isolationist and xenophobic government.

So, Mr Premier, get rid of the faux outrage and pathetic indignation and if you want to have a conversation, at the very least start from a position of honesty.

I hope that they will take a 10% pay cut, furlough days, and you force a few of them into retirement.

Absolutely! And as you are our elected leader you can lead by example and take a pay cut proportionate to the reduction in Government income!

So 100% of public sector workers have continued to work during the lockdown then?

The only sacrifices I see are the 7,500 or private sector workers (you know the ones who fund the public sector) who have been forced to stop working and rely on handouts that aren’t even close to their normal pay.

As of now only one sector has borne the ‘sacrifice’ and no amount of politricks will change that indisputable fact