Cut the dead wood, finance minister tells public sector

Finance Minister Edward Scicluna says "dead wood" in the public sector has to be removed as the Government moves to trim unnecessary expenditure. It was the second time in a week that Prof. Scicluna harped on the importance of cutting costs by changing practices that may be irrelevant to today's needs. Speaking at a business breakfast as part of the pre-Budget consultation period, Prof. Scicluna told representatives of non-governmental organizations, businesses and unions that a spending review will be conducted across the board. "We will also look at the politically sensitive areas as well but unless we change we will continue with hospital queues and children without LSAs," he said. Highlighting one example of looking at things from a different perspective, he noted that there were schools in prime sites that were half empty because of falling student populations. "There are powerful forces pushing to continue doing things as we have always done. But we cannot allow this to continue. We can cut expenditure and it requires training that we are currently undertaking with people in the public service," he said. The first time Prof. Scicluna spoke of expenditure cuts this week was...