scrap heap while the Central Policy Unit is about to take off, senior civil servants were told yesterday.

General Orders, the document which regulates behaviour of public servants will soon be replaced by a new document, `Conditions of Employment and Code of Conduct'. Premier Jennifer Smith told a gathering of senior civil servants that the new document has received the acceptance of the Bermuda Public Service Association.

The Premier was speaking at her quarterly meeting with the Civil Service Executive held yesterday at Fort Hamilton.

"The new document replaces those cumbersome bureaucratic requirements of General Orders which are no longer relevant,'' the Premier said.

"It is Government's intent to push part of the decision making process away from the Executive and thereby provide a degree of autonomy to the line managers.'' Plans to replace General Orders were first announced in last year's Throne Speech as one of the recommendations of the Civil Service Review.

The Premier updated the Executive on other aspects of the government's ongoing modernisation programme.

Government's policy coordination arm, the Central Policy Unit (CPU), is about to hit the ground running with the appointment over the last few months of Policy Analysts from each Ministry.

Ms Smith said that the policy analysts will shortly undergo an 18 month training programme.

The CPU operates out of Cabinet Office and its primary purpose is to improve policy coordination across ministries.

Its first project will be on e-government, said the Premier.

"The aim of this project is to ensure that the Bermuda Government takes full advantage of electronic means of conducting business in order to carry out its internal functions more efficiently and provide better service to the public,'' she said.

"There is no secret to the working of the CPU. Their main function is to help with the coordination of policy and to ensure the high quality of policy proposals. To this end, the CPU works with Ministries to ensure that papers submitted to Cabinet for decision are of standardised high quality, based on sound analysis and take into account the stakeholders' views.'' She urged the civil servants to take full advantage of the CPU, saying it had already been useful in a number of legislative initiatives.

The Future is Now: Premier Jennifer Smith addressing senior civil servants yesterday.