Recruitment, employee bonuses, but also stop to appointments if “the objectives assigned to the subject and defined by the contract are not achieved, according to the progress of the projects for which they have been stipulated”. In the 20 articles of the draft of the decree law on public administration, financed by the Recovery plan, there are the foundations for a substantial reform of the state machinery. A revolution – still subject to changes – which provides for an increase in the workforce but also for the inclusion of employees in merit ranges. A mechanism that should, on the one hand, strengthen the functional capacity of the public administration and, on the other, enhance the staff with ranges of merits and bonuses.
“If a good professional wants to become a general manager in the PA, he currently cannot do it but from tomorrow, if we approve the decree, half of the available places will be put out to competition” said the minister of the PA Renato Brunetta, speaking at the Festival dell economy of Trento: “I have fished out an old norm of mine for first-tier competitions which at 50% will be competed between those who are inside and those who are outside”.
The rules, therefore, range from apprenticeship contracts for the training of young graduates to the modalities for the temporary hiring of technicians and specialized figures who will go both to the governance structures in the plan and to support local authorities.
The decree also provides for accelerated procedures for recruitment with simplified and digital competitions to be closed in 100 days; resources for training young people with apprenticeships and digital databases to hire highly qualified professionals.
The ceiling for the conferral of executive positions to external managers to be hired on a fixed-term contract also doubles: it goes from 5 to 10% for both first-tier and second-tier executives. The administrations involved in the implementation of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan can therefore “derogate, up to double” the percentages provided for “for the purpose of covering vacant managerial positions relating to tasks strictly and directly functional to the implementation of the Plan interventions” . The limit set by law is 5% for executives belonging to the first bracket of the single role and 5% for those belonging to the second bracket. “The positions can be conferred only if the necessary professionalism cannot be found in the roles of the administrations, they find coverage and limits in the recruitment faculties, remain in force until their natural expiry and in any case no later than 31 December 2026”.
The draft decree provides that 500 people are hired on a fixed-term basis with rapid competition, with only one oral, to coordinate, implement and control the NRP: 80 of them will go to the Accounting Office and for “justified needs” another 300 can be hired for governance of the Recovery plan, bringing the total to 800. In total there will be over 24 thousand hires completed by 2026: 1000 to support local authorities “in managing complex procedures”; 268 to the digital transition; 67 to the Agid; 16,500 to the trial office and 5,410 administrative staff to justice.