public service

Noun

public service (countable and uncountable, plural public services)

1. A service performed for the public good.
   • They feel that public service is a noble calling that calls for every citizen in one way or another.
   • They provide counseling as a public service.
2. (countable) A service such as health care, transport, or waste removal provided to the general public, often by the government.
   • In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. The welfare state is dismantled. Essential public services are cut so that the rich may pay less tax. […]2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 23, page 19
3. (countable) The organisation, department or business providing such a service.
4. (uncountable) Government employment, especially in the civil service.
   • In spite of more than three decades of public service, I knew I was an unknown quantity to many of my countrymen and to much of the world when I assumed office.1971, Lyndon Johnson, “‘I feel like I have already been here a year’”, in The Vantage Point, Holt, Reinhart & Winston, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 18
   • We know that there are people in much lower offices in public service who adhere to those principles without question and without problems. Does my right hon. Friend find it regrettable that the Prime Minister does not?2022 June 7, Meg Hillier, “Standards in Public Life”, in parliamentary debates (House of Commons), volume 715, column 676