Two stories in Saturday's newspaper show that the supposedly neutral Civil Service is under threat.

One concerns the surprise move of the Premier's secretary – while she was on holiday – to another job in the Cabinet Office. The other concerns proposals to dismantle the Department of Communication and Information and replace it with separate public affairs officers in each Government Ministry.

With regard to the Premier's secretary, described by former Premier Alex Scott as a highly professional individual, the Bermuda Public Service Union now plans to raise this move with Government, and BPSU president Armell Thomas said that this reflected an increasing politicization of the Civil Service.

He added: "It is amazing in 2009. The Premier has to stop treating civil servants like they are political appointees. He's a smart guy. He knows the process."

But he, or the Cabinet Secretary did not follow it on this occasion, Mr. Thomas added. And that's what the union is upset about. This is not the first time the BPSU has raised these concerns, and it should be even more concerned if the ideas for DCI see the light of day.

It can be argued that it makes sense for each Ministry to have a spokesperson, since that means they will be fully aware of the policies and plans in each Ministry and will be able to give each Minister good advice in an atmosphere of trust.

That, it can be argued is how other governments do it. The British Government does not have a central information office from which all news is disseminated and nor does the US Government. Instead each Ministry has its own press office or spokesperson (or people).

But that's comparing apples with oranges. The UK Transport Ministry or the US Treasury have more employees and a bigger budget than the entire Bermuda Government does. And it should be eminently possible for a public affairs officer to handle more than one Ministry.

Certainly, any idea about increasing the number of public affairs officers should be resisted. Even now, the existing officers seem to be forced to spend much of their time organising meaningless press conferences which are only being used as vehicles for making their Ministers look good. Individual spokespersons for each Ministry would make the press officers complete political creatures.

And the experience of the Ministry of Education, which continues to be served by no fewer than three spokespersons (two in the Ministry and one in DCI) is the proof that "better PR" is not the answer. No press officer, no matter how good, can deliver good public relations unless the policies and programmes underpinning the Ministry are good. When school results were poor, then so was the Ministry's reputation. As they have improved, so has the Ministry's public face.

That does not mean that Government should not have a communications strategy. It should. It needs to communicate to the public what Government is doing and why, what services are available to the public and what issues Government is tackling.

And part of their job is to put Government in a good, or at least explicable, light. But that message should be honest and should be delivered fairly and completely. Spinning all Government news to make Government look good is dangerous, and there has already been too much of this coming from Government, especially from the Cabinet Office where political aides and consultants have displaced professional civil servants.

No one is naïve enough to suppose that civil servants have no political views. But they are supposed to offer their political masters unbiased and straightforward advice, regardless of which party is in power. Mr. Thomas is warning that that may no longer be the case; it's time to stop the rot.