{Full Speech}: Salaries Exceed 2025 Budget By ¢1.3B In First Half- Finance Minister
The Minister for Finance, Cassiel Ato Forson, says last-minute recruitment conducted by the previous government has put undue pressure on the compensation budget for the first half of 2025.
Addressing Parliament on July 24, 2025, he said wages and salaries had exceeded the budget by GH¢1.3 billion for the first six months of the year.
“The wage pressures were largely driven by last-minute recruitments undertaken by the previous government in the last quarter of 2024, especially in the education, health and security sectors.”
In addition, he said ad-hoc reviews of conditions of service undertaken in previous years have distorted the Single Spine Pay Policy and further burdened the public wage bill.
In response to these, he said, the government would conduct regular nationwide staff payroll audits to sanitise government payroll and realign staff from overstaffed and defunct MDAs to areas with critical staffing needs.
The government is also finalising the processes for the establishment of the Independent Emoluments Commission (IEC) as part of broader efforts to reform and reset public sector pay; and issuing an Executive directive mandating all MDAs to seek approval from the Minister of Finance before making any commitments with financial implications on the payroll.
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