Workloads and pay rates are two significant areas of concern for public servants, results from the 2025 census of public servants show.

The census shows that almost a quarter of respondents (23%) said that their workload was well above capacity, with a further 42% saying it was slightly above capacity.

This is a worrying development as high workloads lead to burn out and are a serious health and safety risk.

And when asked about work stress, 44% of respondents said that in the last year they’d experienced work stress “often or always”.

The Public Service Census, Te Taunaki, surveys New Zealand public servants working in departments, ministries and departmental agencies. The 2025 Census ran from 3-21 March and included questions on productivity, delivery and integrity. It is the second such census, the first being held in 2021.

More than 44,000 public servants from 40 agencies shared their feedback and ideas for improving the performance of the public service.

Barriers to productivity

Workloads coupled with inadequate staffing levels were identified by 82% of respondents as a barrier to their teams performing at their best. The two next biggest issues were:

• inefficient decision-making, such as slow timelines, senior leader involvement in small decisions or unclear governance processes (75%)
• complicated or unnecessary business processes (73%).

Only 51% of those taking part in the census agreed that suggestions to improve workplace efficiency or productivity are taken seriously and acted upon.

Change processes not well managed

A contributor to high workloads will have been the Government’s blunt, across-the-board cuts to public services, which have required most agencies to save 6.5% or 7.5% a year.

The way Government agencies managed the resulting tsunami of change processes, which proposed stripping thousands of roles out of the public service, received a thumbs down in the survey.

Only 30% of census respondents believed change was well-managed in their organisation, with 42% disagreeing.

Pay and conditions

Pay was another area of concern, with 39% of respondents saying they are dissatisfied with their pay, compared with 34% who were satisfied.

Only 30% of respondents agreed that their pay adequately reflects their performance, compared with 48% who disagreed.

Public service workers were more positive with their conditions, with 61% of respondents saying they are satisfied with their employment conditions, compared with 17% who are dissatisfied.

Overall, 62% of respondents felt satisfied about their work, with 15% feeling dissatisfied.

Working from home

The coalition Government’s moral panic over working from home in the public sector was clearly overblown, the census results show.

Respondents were clear that working from home isn’t a problem. Only 9% said that working from home had a negative impact on their team’s productivity or ability to get their work done in a timely way. The rest felt it increased productivity (49%) or didn’t make a difference (42%).

Well-motivated

The census showed that public servants were overall motivated to do a good job for New Zealanders in a politically neutral way:

• 96% of respondents said it is important to them that their work contributes to the common good
• 87% of respondents said the work they do contributes to better outcomes for New Zealand
• 95% of respondents agreed that “I have a good understanding of what it means to be a politically neutral public servant”.

Public servants also believed they were delivering value for money with 80% agreeing with the proposition, “the work that I do provides value for taxpayers”.

They were also largely positive about the role of their organisation in advising ministers, with 71% of respondents agreeing that “I am confident that my organisation is free and frank in our advice to Ministers”, while 13% disagreed.

Bullying, harassment, discrimination, workplace culture

Factors contributing to a respectful workplace had slipped slightly since the last census in 2021:'

• People who responded positively to “I feel comfortable being myself at work/with my colleagues” was down from 82% to 80%.
• People who responded positively to “The agency I work for supports and actively promotes a workplace where people are respectful towards one another” was down from 78% to 73%.

Bullying or harassment in the last year was experienced by 12.1% of respondents. Of those, only 52% had reported it.

Only 14% of respondents are satisfied with how matters related to bullying/harassment are resolved in their organisation, with 59% dissatisfied.

There were also 14% of respondents who said they felt they had experienced some form of discrimination in the last year. That figure was significantly higher for people who identify as disabled (33%), and people whose gender is described as “another or multiple genders” (28%). It was also higher (25%) for people whose ethnicity as described as “other”, which covers people who did not identify as Māori, European, Pacific, Asian, Middle Eastern, Latin American or African.  

Māori-Crown capability

Despite the coalition Government’s push back on te reo Māori and tikanga Māori within the public service and its undermining of the status of Te Tiriti o Waitangi, respondents said Māori-Crown capability had improved since 2021 as can be seen in the responses to the following statements:

• “I understand how my agency's Te Tiriti o Waitangi/Treaty of Waitangi responsibilities apply to its work” was up by 8% to 77%
• “I am encouraged and supported to engage with Māori and to understand Māori perspectives” was up by 6% to 71%
• “I feel that leaders in my agency show a commitment to strengthening the relationships between Māori and the Crown” was up by 1% to 68%
• “Staff are supported to improve our te reo Māori (e.g. through on-the-job learning, in-house courses, etc” was up by 5% to 64%.