The Salaries and Remuneration Commission (SRC), which has in the last three years been vocal on the need to rein in the ballooning public wage bill, will increase its expenditure on salaries for staff by 39 per cent in the new financial year that starts next month.

The Sarah Serem-led commission has been allocated Sh233 million for the compensation of employees in the Budget estimates approved by the Cabinet in April. This is an increase from Sh161 million in the current financial year.

In addition, the commission, which started its operations in January 2012, will more than double its spending on office supplies, tea, and other goods and services to Sh694 million from Sh279 million.

This will see it triple its expenses to Sh922 million, which may make it more difficult for it to ask other Government departments to reduce their recurrent expenditure.

The commission spent Sh346 million and Sh431.5 million in 2012-13 and 2013-14, respectively.

Another major contradiction in the Government wage bill policy is found in the Presidency.

Though the 2015-16 Budget states at its beginning that the biggest threat to the country is the ballooning wage bill, the Presidency — whose expenses include salaries of State House officials and officials from the deputy president’s office as well as the Cabinet — has been allocated a 31 per cent increase for salaries to Sh1.4 billion.

Pay cut

This rise in wages for top Government officials reverses President Uhuru Kenyatta’s efforts to rein in a runaway salary bill. Last year, the President led his Cabinet in taking a pay cut and implored parastatal heads to follow suit.

Further, in the new Budget, which is set to be read in Parliament the next couple of weeks, the cost of managing Cabinet affairs has risen almost five-fold from Sh573 million to Sh2.6 billion.

Institutions such as the Cabinet, Presidency and SRC are expected to set the path other Government agencies should follow.

But by seeking higher allocations for salaries and other recurrent expenditure, they will likely face resistance when they ask the rest of the Government to cut down on their spending.

Further, the SRC was expected to lessen the wage bill burden on taxpayers by the end of its first three years in office, but it appears Kenyans will have to wait a while longer for this.

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