Fewer cars to civil servants
THE government yesterday announced a new policy that will severely limit the number of state employees who qualify for cars — a move which it says will slash its motor vehicle fleet by as much as 80 per cent.
The administration’s statement announcing the policy shift did not say how many employees now qualified for government-owned cars, but other sources estimated that it is several hundred.
“The assignment of vehicles will now be confined to a greatly reduced list of public officers such as Permanent Secretaries and heads of specified departments,” said the statement from the finance ministry’s expenditure and audit control division.
However, with yesterday’s public holiday for independence anniversary celebrations, officials were unavailable to elaborate.
According to yesterday’s statement, public officers who no longer qualify for government-owned vehicles will be given the option to purchase those they are currently assigned, under loan agreements with the Accountant General’s Department.
“The move will result in a reduction of the current fleet of government-owned vehicles by over 80 per cent,” it added.
For the political directors, which broadly covers senior and junior ministers, the Cabinet will determine who qualifies for assigned vehicles, while the finance ministry will have that job with regard to public officers.
The directors will make the determination in state agencies and companies, but in accordance with the policy.
Finance Minister Omar Davies signalled a shift in the government’s motor vehicle policy in his February budget, when he reduced the value of the vehicles on which qualified public servants get a 80 per cent duty rebate. Prior to the change, qualified public officers paid duty of 20 per cent of the fee on board (FOB) value of the vehicle, up to US$30,000. Davies reduced that to a cost insurance freight (CIF) value of US$25,000.
Davies had also said that there would be a general tightening-up of the policy, including enforcing the Customs laws so as to limit the numbers and types of vehicles which people doing contracts for the government can import duty-free.
Yesterday’s statement said that this phase of the policy — applicable to a wide-range of government entities — was part of an effort to “enhance efficiency, cut costs and improve transparency in the public sector”.
While current figures on value and cost of the upkeep of government vehicles were not immediately available, the 1999 Orane Report on cutting waste in the public sector indicated that the administration spent $250 million a year on petrol alone, with the police being responsible for half that sum.
At the time, Orane pointed to a “pervasive misuse and abuse inherent” in the system that was broadly used in the public sector to manage fuel consumption.
Although the policy is only now being implemented, the statement said that it was approved by the Cabinet in February and became effective in August — when the deadline for all ministries and agencies to submit to the finance ministry their inventory of motor vehicles and the names of officers to whom they were assigned.