THE UK government could be made cheaper and more efficient if civil servants were paid 50 pence an hour, the boss of Topshop has claimed.
In a report into government waste, Sir Philip Green insisted Whitehall could easily turn a massive profit if ministers had the courage to run it like an international clothing business.
He said: “You’ve got civil servants here on eighty or ninety grand a year while the taxpayer is handing over between 30% and 40% of their income. Margin-wise that’s as tight as a gnat’s chuff.
“Either you have to put the price up or cut your manufacturing costs. That’s why I’m recommending that the entire civil service be handed over to this little chap I know in Mauritius.
“He has access to thousands of high-quality, fine-fingered Bangladeshis who could knock you out a department of health for an average of 48p an hour.
“And you don’t need multi-million pound press offices and advertising budgets. Every time the little Bangladeshis come up with a new policy initiative we just sellotape a copy of it to one of Kate Moss’s nipples and get a double page spread in the Daily Mail.”
He added: “They can also do human resources, accounting and policy implementation, working 12 hour shifts with the option of unlimited overtime. Within two years you’re looking at an annual profit of five maybe six hundred million quid.
“If the secretary of state can persuade his wife to live in Monaco for nine months of the year he can pay her the full whack as a tax free dividend.
“And then he can have a boat.”
A Downing Street spokesman said the prime minister would consider Sir Philip’s recommendations, adding: “We are definitely going to do this.”
