Harney aims to cut 5000 staff from HSE??

mrgaa1 wrote: »

I'd hope they'd start the process with middle managers and such likes and leave the real workers alone.

its aimed at admin, clerical and support not medical staff

johnboy_123 wrote: »

employment law needs to be changed then. In the private sector if there is no work you are let go. If you are working and your scratching your hole your let go without redundancy

Eh? If you're hired as a permanent employee you're there until you're fired for being in breach of your contract, or you leave voluntarily, or you are made redundant.

Redundancy is what happens when there is no work to be done - hence the actual term, "redundant".

Is €80k a head enough to tempt these guys out of their nice little earners? Of course €80k is just the pay off. they still will get full pensions.

johnboy_123 wrote: »

The problem is that in the real world if a private company wants to get rid of you they can and there is little you can do about it. In the public sector you can do little or no work. Take as many sick days as you want...and as long as your in the union you wont be touched...The gov should send a proposal to all P.S/C.S workers and their respective bosses with a daily work requirement. For example - The dole office..A worker there should be able to process say 5 claims an hour. Say they work 7 hours. That way they must have 35 claims processed at the end of the day. If not they get a verbal warning....After 2 verbals its a writen and then its the sack no redundancies....Introduce this with simular measures and it will do 2 things it will route out the lazy fecks and sacke them without paying redundancy and it will also incentivise people to work...Too long have P.S workers worked on the basis of the Carrot. Its now time for the stick.

I'm not defending the PS or anything: I'm just saying that there are rules that protect private sector employees also.

I agree that once a company wants you out, you are in for a tough time - but if you are a permanent employee, you DO have rights. You can't just be told - sorry we don't need you anymore, here's your notice.

You get redundancy.

If you breach your contract, they can fire you. Companies usually have a disciplinary process in place however for this.

In that sense, I think there's probably a bunch of public sector employees that could be done for breach of contract (excessive sick days, not meeting targets etc) but it all has to follow process. The difference is, it seems that in the public sector it's a lot more difficult to begin this process (I would guess due to the unions being as they are). Whilst in the private sector... the process usually begins a lot quicker.

Instead of all the media hysteria perhaps we should think about this (and I am a director of an SME in the private sector with no PS contracts).

Let's suppose I am a 30 year old who joined the public sector when I got my leaving cert. It seemed like a job at the time. Since then I have risen through the ranks, and I now work in the admin department of a major hospital. I have a wife and children, and a vastly inflated mortgage. I have a secure pension fund, but I am too young to see the value of that. Now I am threatened with redundancy. Who out there is going to want to hire a thirty year old hospital administrator? My pension fund will not provide a living wage in thirty years time.

Let's now suppose I am a fifty year old. I have worked in the PS for thirty years in the HSE. Yes, I knew that in the last few years there has been far too much duplication of effort, too many people doing the same job to achieved obscure government targets etc. That was not as a result of my management although I accept that my union has a case to answer. But if I accept redundancy, where do I go next? The private sector health industry is not exactly screaming for fifty year old PS administrators is it?

In either case I look towards the head of my organisation for leadership, and I find Minister Harney, and I find that the whole business is not her responsibility. No-one tells me whose responsibility it actually is, so I am expected to make a decision on my future and that of my family with no useful information at all.

I joined the HSE because it was an attractive job and I had sufficient leaving certs to qualify. Of course the terms were attractive -- who applies for a job where they aren't? The pension system was a good deal if I stayed long enough, and the pay was better than I would get (eventually) in the accounts department of a company. Isn't that why anyone applies for a job?

Now, suddenly, the country is in deep s**t and it's my fault for accepting a salary that my private sector colleagues could not command -- but I didn't set those salary levels. I just took advantage of them as an employee. Who doesn't?

So where do we look to "save Ireland?" Who is to blame and who is to lead the recovery while we are all distracted in beating the s**T out of the public sector?

Let's face it for once. It isn't going to be Cowen and Lenihan or Harney or Gormley, or any of the posturing members of what is laughingly called the "opposition". I am not a politician, but I do understand basic economics which state that if one continues to spend more than one earns one will go bust eventually. I do understand that any employee spending more than he earns can't simply expect his employer to pay up the difference, although that is what the government seems to expect. Instead, the employee must cut his costs to meet his income.

The greedy, incompetent and blustering idiots in the Dail won't do that. They will go to their employers and take the money from them whether they like it or not, even if many of the employers simply can't afford it. They will do that because they haven't the guts to abolish all the wasteful quangos, or absorb the disastrous HSE into the Department of Health where it should be. They will not suffer the loss of their limousines and their chauffeurs, or their government jet, their bloated expenses and their excessive salaries. They will not demand that ministers actually start doing the jobs they are paid for. Instead they will reduce or eliminate the already poor services that the people rely upon. They will rob the poor, the sick, and the elderly. They will hit the families already struggling to pay their way without jobs and with little future. They will do that because that is all they can comprehend.

I think there is a solution, but whether it will happen or not is open to question. Step one is that the government loses the vote on the budget in December, and a new government is formed. That will almost certainly be another coalition just as misguided as the current one, and the nation's finances will continue down the black hole they have dug with such enthusiasm. Eventually in the face of public outrage and national bankruptcy that government will also fail. Then, hopefully, a few competent TDs from across the parties (surely there must be some?) will form a new party and enter government with, finally, a resolve to ruthlessly attack government waste and properly regulate the financial industry. Perhaps even a government where ministers actually know their jobs and, for once, do them without needing rafts of agencies and advisers.

*End of rant*