How do people feel about this one? Will it be short and sweet?
Mod warning:
https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121425200/#Comment_121425200
I think it is important when thinking about this proposal to look at it as what the year by year increase is as opposed to the headline 12% increase over 2.5 years.
This proposal on the table (on a time apportioned basis) are the following increases in each year:
This means at the end of 2026 your wage will be 7.7% higher than it was at the start of 2024.
Workings: (1*1.0176*1.0193*1.0383 = 1.0769% or 7.7%)
I think the Government has been seriously caught out by not settling earlier . The strength of response in Northern Ireland resulting in the most comprehensive strike in their history .150 thousand people walking out of work, a few miles up the road cannot be ignored down here.
There is also the increased volatility in markets due to the Red Sea impasse that will add further to inflation if it is prolonged.
Public sector pay should have been resolved before Christmas and would by now be over and done with . 8.50 per cent over two years with the most of it front loaded would have been accepted.It will cost significantly more now .
Which is why I am stressing "Contractors".
People are saying that no-one should cross a picket line but that is not always the case and to make sure that your contractor colleagues (especially prevalent in IT) are not under undue pressure, should it ever come to a strike
Inflation can be a good thing for holders of longterm debt, especially states, if they do not need to refinance at higher rates. Essentially, the amount owed lessens in real-term value.
So there is an argumemt to be made that some countries would prefer inflation stay high a little longer.
That's a very different situation from employees choosing to cross a picket line.
What I look at is the national debt and more specifically, it`s direction. Right now, it seems to be falling but at a very slow pace. This indicates the markets believe inflation is more likely to rise than to fall.
What a bizarre idea, the markets determine how large the national debt is?!?!? Utterly nonsensical.
I couldn't give a fcuk what the markets think inflation is GOING to do, we'll find out soon enough. I am concerned with what inflation ALREADY HAS done, how far behind my pay has fallen, and how much my standard of living has been cut. The national debt is irrelevant as far as the pay talks are concerned.
I had people in who are embedded contractors. They are set hours a week or on specific projects. Not that easy for them
Actually learned that back in the day when I was a contractor, on shift, in a lab. There was talk of a strike and I was told by my company that I was not part of any industrial action and that I would not have my contract renewed, should I not present for work.
They could not cancel my contract but they could damn well not renew. Strike did not happen in the end but, on a rolling 3 month contract, I was in no position to argue.
Local union rep basically said the same to me, as I said to others later. I was to present to "work" (nothing would be happening), they explained to my team-mates, and everyone was in agreement.
Stop being pedantic, you know what I mean.
One metric the government has it`s eye on is inflation and the impact pay rises may have on prices. What I look at is the national debt and more specifically, it`s direction. Right now, it seems to be falling but at a very slow pace. This indicates the markets believe inflation is more likely to rise than to fall. The ECB on the other hand has indicated it is prepared to yield to the will of governments, the markets and anyone with a debt and will probably cut interest rates in the summer. But if it does, and if the markets are right on inflation, any cut in interest rates will spur further inflation and result in a fall in living standards as pay rises will be wiped out by rising prices. Maybe, cutting expendature is the way to go.
All of my Dept's contractors are technically sole traders and self-employed and decide what days they work, so can easily avoid strike action by working around them. In fact, they don't even have desks, since Covid.
I doubt any of them would pass a picket, (but couldn't guarantee it).
You can't 'make' other humans do anything. You may have given them an instruction, but it's their choice whether to follow and their responsibility to deal with the outcome.
Well . . . The deal collapses after the offer from the first year as far as I'm concerned. 1.75% is a real terms pay cut. We are still taking pay cuts .... fifteen years on from the economic collapse of 2008.
I've made contractors pass the picket, to be honest. They didn't want to but I was aware that they were in a precarious position, for breach of contract, if they did not sign in
You think giving large public sector pay rises buys votes? I don’t.
I actually think they lose more votes by doing it cos Irish Independent readers (like yourself) get whipped up and angry over it and so don’t vote for them.
Our public service is a mess across the board at the moment and pay is a huge reason for that.
Crossing a picket is never something I would do under virtually any circumstances.
If a worker wants to cross the picket, I respect their decision to do so. They can respect my decision to act professional with them in work but not a jot more.
Crossing a picket is the lowest of the low in my eyes.
If I was a scab, undermining the work of my colleagues to achieve better conditions for all, I'd expect to be treated like a scab.
Totally agree with you, very bad behaviour, who wants to work with colleagues like that. Everyone has freedom of choice, respect to whichever way they swing
I remember a discussion about twenty years later, suggesting that they still remembered exactly who the strike breakers were, and treated them accordingly.
and that’s a shocking behaviour tbh.Nothing to be proud of. If an employer treated striking employees “accordingly”, they would all ask for legal actions and rightly so.
Don’t do what you would not like others do to you. Just respect everyone.
Hopefully it sharpens the minds of our lot.
In related news.
Northern Ireland's public sector has completely shut down, for strike.
RTE is not as such part of the public sector and not part of this pay agreement. You have a remarkable record of spouting utter nonsense on public sector threads.
Please don't peddle that myth about the reduction in pay scales for new entrants.
These reductions were imposed unilaterally by government, they were never negotiated or agreed with unions.
If you think the public sector does nothing of benefit for the public then you are simply a moron.
I think that really depends on the strength of the reasoning for a strike. Striking that an 8.5% pay rise isn’t enough probably isn’t going to invoke too much passion to be perfectly honest. I would say there is a 1% chance of a strike. Possibly less.
It wasn’t a one year offer. I’d have thought you’d know that at this stage.
Crossing the picket isn't the problem.
Working with colleagues afterwards who know that you crossed the picket is the problem.
Of course isn't practical.
Some of the posters are either arguing in bad faith or maybe betraying a lack of real world cop on.
Good stuff, you’re one of them.
You think it’s practical. I don’t. I’ll leave it there. Nothing to do with the pay talks.
Yes I think the public sector should in fact be appraised constantly for perfomance, and it happened before the recession as well, hence the "nua" in An bord snip nua, the previous one happened almost 20 years before that.
People shouldnt be taxed to the hilt so the public sector can continue to live gilded lives doing nothing of benefit for the public they serve in name only.
Its a thing called value for money on the taxes I am forced to pay.
Where did I say they were simple structures???
Again, you both think it’s practical. I don’t. I’ll leave it there.
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