I realise I'm coming to this debate late in the day, but I am so sick of this myth going around that public servants treat sick leave like some kind of extension of their annual leave. This is so untrue. The girl I share a room with has taken one days sick leave in the year and a half I have been working with her and I have often seen her coming into work when she is obviously not well. My own boss came into work yesterday after having dealt with her house being completely flooded, handled a major crisis at work, went for a root canal treatment and was back at her desk an hour later. A friend of mine has never taken a days sick leave in ten years and always takes annual leave when she is unwell. I spent three days in hospital recently having tests. On the fourth day, after the final test, I headed straight to the bus stop and came into work. None of us would be considered unusual in the civil service and its really annoying to read all these stupid stories going around. As I have said before, Yes there are some chancers and lazy soandsos in the Civil Service and nobody would be happier to see them get their comeuppance than their fed up colleagues. But please don't tar us all with the same brush. Its lazy and unintelligent and comes across as smug and arrogant.