Brian Cowen strongly influenced by civil service advice

[patslatt]

According to a senior civil servant of my acquaintance,Brian Cowen is well liked by civil servants of all the departments he headed because he understands and follows the advice of civil servants and professional advisers,unlike many other ministers who are fond of political expediency. This civil servant expects Cowen as Taoiseach to follow a technocratic approach,generally doing what is in the best interest of the country.

A forerunner of this approach was his clear pledge as Minister of Finance to maintain the programme of infrastructure modernisation,since historically capital programmes were the first to go in an economic downturn. He will be tested soon on this pledge in the imminent negotiations on Social Partnership's wage increases for the overpaid public sector: their expectations of continuing large pay increases will have to be managed down if there is to be room in future budgets for pledged capital spending programmes.

If the technocratic approach is followed,public sector reform should be at the top of the agenda. In a slow growth or recessionary economy, wasteful government spending should not be tolerated. The HSE health service likely will come under particularly sharp scrutiny. Recently,Finance has gone public with its dissatisfaction over the poor budgeting practices of the HSE.

[adamirer]

He certainly took the advice in DFA on the UN seat and did a good job at doing what advised on it.