Without a good old-fashioned blood-letting at the Ministry of Health, how will it get better?

But if there are no bits left over, won't the restructuring be a waste of time?

Dunno what exactly is going at the Ministry of Health.

It certainly doesn’t look like a blood-letting.

But the Public Service Association is bleating that “a substantial number of redundancies” may result from the latest restructuring.

According to Radio New Zealand –

Uncertainty surrounds the future of many jobs at the ministry, which is introducing a new policy advice structure in February.

Eighty-nine current policy advisers have to apply for a total of 90 jobs, only 60 of which involve pure policy advice.

PSA national secretary Brenda Pilott says 150 of its members are affected.

The ministry is saying it’s too early to say how many redundancies will result, but the overall number of staff will remain largely unchanged.

Alf doesn’t see much point to the excercise if the overall number of staff remains largely unchanged.

Perhaps there’s more to this that we haven’t been told.

Alf will try to winkle it out of Tony Ryall, the splendid bloke who is our Minister of Health and a good mate of the Member for Eketahuna North.

But more than one thing is bloody bemusing.

If 89 current policy advisers have to apply for a total of 90 jobs, where do the job cuts and savings come in?

And if only 60 of the 90 jobs involve pure policy advice, is Alf to suppose the other 30 will involve impure policy advice?