Public service still larger than just nine months ago

Nicola Willis announced:

Workforce data for the quarter from 31 December 23 to 31 March 24 shows a decrease of 0.6 per cent (or 416 FTEs) indicating workforce size peaked in December.

“We knew that the recent increase in the number of back-office public service roles was unaffordable and needed to be reined in,” Public Service Minister Nicola Willis says. 

The full impact of Budget 2024 decisions is yet to be realised which is why the nine months to 31 March 2024 still shows a small net increase of 3.4 per cent in FTE since June 2023 to 65,283 FTEs.

Now this is only to 31 March, but the fact that FTEs are 3.4% higher than just before the election shows how fast it grew in the second half of last year.