BY KEITH JACKSON

FOLLOWING ILYA GRIDNEFF’s expose that Australian public servants working for AusAID were still taking the enormous pay packets they had denied private contractors, Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, Kevin Rudd, has issued a media release entitled, Ensuring value for money from public servant aid advisers.

The release announces “a review of the pay and conditions offered to public servants engaged overseas as Australian aid advisers,” to be completed in six months. Six months!

Mr Rudd proclaims this as “a vital next step in ensuring advisers under the aid program, be they commercially engaged or a government employee, are value for money [sic] .”

He says, following the reduction commercial advisers’ fees of around 25 percent, “a similar approach is also needed in regards to the remuneration of Australian government deployees [sic] engaged as advisers as part of the aid program.”

Mr Rudd believes this review, to be conducted by AusAID, will “provide the government with an equitable, consistent, cost-effective approach.”

Mr Rudd issued this gem of public service catch-up football from Abu Dhabi.

PNG Attitude has noted September 2011 in its ‘Events Coming But Excruciatingly Slowly’ diary.