Cash-strapped NHS Wales Networks and Planning—which racked up a staggering £183 million deficit last year—seems to have found a pot of gold after all. They’re splashing out on an Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Champion for the Women’s Health Network, with an annual salary that ranges from a jaw-dropping £105,504 to £139,882. Meanwhile, a Senior Biomedical Scientist, responsible for conducting vital tests to aid in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases, is only pulling in a paltry £44,000 a year….
“Taxpayers in Wales are sick of seeing their hard-earned cash wasted on pointless non-jobs.”
The lucky DEI hire will be tasked with crafting “inclusive” leadership and services. The position offers a generous array of benefits, such as the option to work from home as desired and a 42% discount on a new bike for those who prefer cycling to the office. Nice work if you can get it…
While Rachel Reeves goes on about making savings in government, over at HMRC the nation’s tax overlords have been busy designing more “learning products” to enforce the agency’s equality and diversity goals. If only they could be bothered to pick up the phone…
HMRC’s 25-strong Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion team spent 2023 putting together an optional “Building an Inclusive Workplace” training module to “allow colleagues to upskill themselves in inclusive practices.” That’s £4 million in salaries for woke jobs well spent…
It turns out the training is so boring that the EDI team itself can’t even be bothered to do it. Guido can reveal that as of last month a measly 4 out of 25 had bothered to complete it. A completion rate of 16% – no inclusivity here…
The government is making noises, as it often likes to do, about clamping down on public sector woke wastage. New guidance to civil servants instructs them to “cease all external Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion spend in the Civil Service unless signed off and cleared by Ministers.” This comes as research by the TaxPayers’ Alliance today reveals spending has more than doubled in the last four years on “staff networks”, which take up civil servants’ time and waste taxpayer funds on events. Examples include Black History Month’s “All about hair – an insight to afro-textured hair” – hosted by the DVLA…
£652,000 in taxpayer cash has been spent by quangos on these networks since 2020 and the amount of staff time taken up by their running is equivalent to around 80 average full-time employees. Transport for London is the worst offender with a total of £120,000 spent and 140 events hosted, followed by the House of Commons at £96,000. £104,248 in taxpayer cash was spent in 2019/20 – that’s now ballooned to £229,767. If this trend continues, by 2040 these networks will cost the taxpayer approximately £2,511,610 annually…
The actual cost is likely to be higher. HMRC admits it does “not ask that colleagues centrally report time spent engaging with Staff Diversity Networks”, so staff time spent on them remains untracked. New figures this week reveal trust in the civil service has fallen by 6% in a year. Guido wonders if the two might be connected…
Starmer said to Robert Peston this afternoon:
“I’m fed up with the fact that families across the country see their bills go up and down on energy businesses bills go up and down on energy because of the actions of Putin or Trump across the world.”