Retired and redundant civil servants are being re-recruited to government jobs under a pilot scheme launched by the Cabinet Office. Some former staff are being re-employed using zero-hours contracts when full-time employees cannot cope with the workload, a leaked document shows.

The disclosure of the pilot, dubbed by opponents as a “Dad’s Army” solution to Whitehall’s staffing crisis, comes as mandarins brace themselves for further cuts. More than 80,000 full-time civil servants have left their jobs since 2010 with a similar number expected to leave during the current parliament.

Public sector unions said the pilot’s emphasis on using retired civil servants as well as zero-hours contracts show that the government has made serious and costly staffing errors. Mark Serwotka, the head of Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS), said: “None of this would be necessary if they’d negotiated and planned properly in the first place instead of wilfully slashing jobs to meet arbitrary spending cuts targets.”

Dave Penman, the head of the FDA, the union representing senior civil servants, said: “They are not using the term ‘zero-hours contract’, but that is exactly what is being suggested.”

The pilot’s existence emerged in a 60-page document entitled Re-employing Retired Civil Servants, which was sent to management staff of several government departments last month. The document outlines the benefits of recruiting retired staff during busy periods, as well as those who have previously been made redundant.

“This scheme is primarily aimed at retired civil servants who may wish to supplement their pension income, however, departments may also want to consider re-employing former civil servants, who are not retired,” the document says.

Managers are told in the document that they could recruit former staff using two types of recommended agreement – ad hoc contracts or annualised agreements. “The use of ad hoc contracts is appropriate when staff are required to work for brief periods at short notice, in situations when workloads are impossible to accurately predict,” it said.

Managers are warned that such contracts should be used with caution to ensure that they do not give a worker so many hours that they can claim to be permanently employed. “Departments should take care to avoid scheduling hours that may create a situation where employees are entitled to claim permanent status, and the rights that are associated with it,” it says.

The document also suggests the use of “annualised contracts” which require workers to cover a certain number of hours over the year, but with a degree of flexibility about when those hours are worked. An employee on such a contract can be paid in advance for the unallocated time and may be called upon at short notice.

A retired civil servant’s pension payments would be reduced if the total of the new salary and pension is more than his or her previous salary, the document says.



It also warns that, if a worker is re-employed within six months of leaving the civil service, they would be required to repay a proportion of the compensation received.

Cabinet Office managers hope to circulate a completed version of the guidelines by the end of September, following consultations with staff.

Paul Flynn, the MP and member of the public administration and constitutional affairs committee, said the plans are a “cheap, mean ploy” for the government to disguise under-staffing in permanent jobs.

“It’s an odd, surreal document offering zero-hours contracts plus an exploitative one-sided deal to individual pensioners devoid of trade union protection.” he said.

New figures released on Wednesday from the Office for National Statistics show that the number of workers on zero-hours contracts has increased by nearly 20% this year.

A spokesman for the Cabinet Office confirmed the use of zero-hours contracts, but added that the re-employment of retired civil servants is not current government policy.

“It is being piloted as a way of providing experienced temporary staff at times when teams may be under seasonal pressure,” he said, but would not specify which government departments have been involved.

“Re-employed civil servants will not fill posts that have been vacated by staff who have left due to redundancy. They are being re-employed to supplement existing staff levels when required, not replace them,” he said.

