Public administrations cease to be the exclusive choice of the minister

The “important aspects” of the bill of the Ministry of the Interior for the new system of selection of administrations in Publicwhich echo – as he said – the government’s will to improve the performance of the state machine, but also to attract competent executives, highlighted the Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis from the floor of the Parliament.

He even announced that by the end of the year he will come the first announcement for hospital administrators and announced her increase in directors’ fees of national organizations and large hospitals at the level of the salaries of the General Secretaries.

“Intersection in the relationship between governments and the state apparatus”

During his speech in the debate on the n/s in the Plenary Session of the Parliament, the prime minister noted that the initiative constitutes a real intersection in the relationship between governments and the political system with the state apparatus, as it seals it from party interventions.

“With the new arrangements, the administrators of hundreds of public and private legal entities cease to be the minister’s exclusive choice, as was the case until recently to a large extent. From now on, the hierarchy of the country’s administrative body will not be determined only by the government but also by the abilities and experience of the candidates, always in relation to the needs of the sector in which they are called to serve,” he stressed.

As he noted, this direction was “again set in motion by our own law in the previous four years” which took “the first steps to release the State from the respective government”.

“Today we are improving this institutional framework and making a key reform in the overall way public administration operates, and overcoming implementation problems we identified in the previous legislative framework, we are completing this important intervention,” the Prime Minister underlined.

The responsibility for the first evaluation passes to ASEP

Focusing on the provisions of the bill under discussion, the prime minister said that “on the one hand we are setting specific goals and on the other we are introducing procedures that free up the powers of the public administration so that its work becomes more productive”.

Among other things, he said that the responsibility for the first evaluation of the nearly 600 heads of public bodies now passes to ASEP “and in fact, this seal of merit is accompanied by substantial guarantees so that we can simultaneously get quick results”, as he said.

For example, organizations are divided into national and local organizations, while a third special category concerns hospitals. Especially for hospitals, an overall announcement will be made instead of the hundreds that were made until now for each position separately. Absolute priority, as he said, is to start with this one first announcement for hospital administrators, with this ambition must be issued before the end of the year.

Assessments can proceed simultaneously from different committees and all control stages will have specific, strict deadlines. “What is the profile of the candidates? They must have studies and work experience that certifies relevance to their subject and reasonable experience for some time in positions of responsibility” explained Mr. Mitsotakis, stressing that “it is time to put a definitive end to a practice that has been happening for many decades to are chosen e.g. hospital administrators party friends without serving the major, to put the right person in the right position”.

“These are decades-old pathogens. The time has come, all of us together, to take an important step towards the de-partisanship of the state” he added.

Skills test and interview

Another innovation – he said – is structured skills tests to “see how well these people can respond”. “And because I have heard strong criticism to say that anyone who has confidence in their abilities has nothing to fear from such a process” he assured.

The goal, as he underlined, is to place the right person in the right position and that is why there is the institution of the interview by the Selection Committee, where 7 of the 15 best candidates will participate. “First of all, there will be the so-called on off criteria and in them studies and work experience will be taken into account. From there on, a double scoring system from ASEP with the skills tests and the interview,” he noted.

Measurable goals and productivity premiums

He also said that new managers of public agencies should draw up annual action plans and identify measurable goals. Based on these they will be evaluated every year and can be rewarded with a productivity bonus or removed if they fail in what they undertook to do.

As he explained, when someone is removed because he did not achieve the objectives, the minister is then obliged to choose from the two remaining whom the same process has qualified, so that he knows that he cannot then start the process from the beginning or choose whoever he wants.

“The responsibility for the final choice rests with the political leader”

Mr. Mitsotakis described the Ministry of Interior’s bill as a “great effort for the Greek State to become independent of party interests, but above all to acquire new executives, worthy executives, in critical positions.”

At the same time fending off the criticism of the opposition, he said that “with today’s reform, the state is liberating, the state is not becoming autonomous” and “that is why the political responsibility still rests with the political leader, the minister, who has the responsibility of each body”. “The responsibility for the final choice between, as I said, a subset of three candidates, rests and should in our view still rest with the political superior… The relevant minister will choose the candidate he considers most suitable from among the top three indicated by the Committee of seven of the final selection, after the multiple stages of this process. And of course, the minister, the political leader, is the one who will approve the plans, the goals, the budgets of the administrations,” he said.

“The objections of the opposition are unfounded”

Mr. Mitsotakis described the opposition’s accusations of favoritism and partisanship as baseless, as – as he said – the very provisions of the bill refute them. “What kind of partisanship is this when, after all, the political boss can’t intervene at all until three resumes arrive in his office,” he asked, while regarding the criticism of the interview he replied: “There is no serious way of evaluating personnel in the world – to me show one- that does not at some time, somewhere, include a natural question-and-answer process.’

At the end of the year, the announcement for hospital administrators – Their fees are increased to the level of the salaries of General Secretaries

The prime minister emphasized that the new bill will be tested in practice with the first announcement for hospital administrators and announced that “we will increase the salaries of the administrators of national organizations and large hospitals to the level of the General Secretary’s salaries.” As he said, there will be a corresponding increase for the administrators of smaller organizations.

“Obviously, the State can never pay the same salaries as the private sector. It does not happen anywhere, with some exceptions, such as possibly Singapore, which has completely different pay systems for civil servants. But, it is a reality that if we want to attract, for example, an executive from the private sector to ask him to be the Governor of a hospital, the fees cannot be as low as they are today,” explained the prime minister.

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