Over the year's, public service ethics and values eroded very fast.
This is according to Ms. Ruth Liloqula, Secretary to the Cabinet, during a dinner for Pacific Women's Perspective on Corruption Dinner at the Sea King restaurant hosted by Transparency Solomon Islands (TSI).She stressed that the existence of politicians who continue to struggle on the fight against corruption is "not an easy task but one that must be addressed now".
Ms. Liloqula stressed that strengthening and re-establishment of values and ethics is good for the integrity of the public service in the fight against corruption.
She added that corruption is creeping into the public service and cripples the system which fails to deal with these serious misconduct and practices.
Ms. Liloqula mentioned that the public sector is the most important impediment to development and growth of any country.
"This is not entirely the government's fault of any political government. However, it is an indication of the level and depth of corruption in the public service, which affects its ability to perform or deliver services and implement programmes."
As public servants fail to deal with performance issues and personal management issues, and as misconduct is not dealt with, slowly but surely these turn to corrupt activities, she said.
Ms. Liloqula stated that with the impact of corruption in the public sector, there is enormous degree of discretion among bureaucrats and politicians which place corrupt practices on the rise.
She said that what needs to be done to stomp out corruption is to gain public confidence in executive government, which needs to be considered differently from the confidence of the public sector.
"There must be some mechanisms by which corrupt individual can be found and adequately disciplined for the wrongs they have done to the society, the reform of public administration should serve to create a more professional culture of integrity and build efficient management ranks," she stressed.