Speaking to Public Servant magazine, he said: “If you were in the civil service now you would wonder whether the particular contribution you make is valued by this government.”
“Does the coalition actually appear to appreciate what the civil service does and the competence of its top people? I think the answer would be ‘no’,” he added.
Mottram also said that civil service pay is too low to retain staff: “If you were weighing up the financial rewards of staying on as a permanent secretary or leaving to become a local government chief executive or a university vice-chancellor, then you might feel that you were at the bottom of the pecking order.”