Croke Park Agreement

Just more fudging of figures by government - Howlin openly admitted that the €650 'saved' doesn't include €680m in lump sums paid out. There will no doubt be a response saying these have to be paid anyway but my point is that we should report things as they are - i.e no saving this year and if the saving is €1bn next year well and good. Stop smoothing out figures!

My beef here is not with public sector workers (we've enough of those threads), simply the continued spin and false reporting and lazy journalism.

I’m not disputing the figures for savings, as a certain amount of independent verification has been carried out. That said, my own personal view is that Minister Howlin has delivered on very soft targets so far - the “low hanging fruit”.

This view is confirmed by:

• The implementation body’s own report, which under “Assessment and Conclusions” on page 29, states that it “is of the view that accelerating change now needs to occur across all public service bodies, in every sector, with an increased sense of urgency. It is not sufficient to rely on the reforms delivered to date. There is a need to go much further in light of the continued very difficult circumstances confronting the economy. It is essential, therefore, that management work proactively with staff and their representatives to explore opportunities for further far reaching reform and to deliver the change required in a time-bound way. Over the coming months, the Body will be engaging with top management in each sector to analyse in detail their plans for future reform and its delivery”.

• Comments by Minister Varadkar that a new Croke Park Agreement should allow for compulsory redundancies in the public service, as opposed to the re-deployments that currently take place when services / activities are ceased (http://www.independent.ie/national-news/leo-varadkar-public-sector-compulsory-redundancy-comments-infuriate-unions-3138317.html). Of course these views were attacked by a prominent public service union and opposed by Minister Howlin.

• CPSU, which campaigned for a No vote in the referendum, now seeking a pay increase from savings claimed for the Croke Park Agreement.

The jury is still out on whether Croke Park can continue to deliver or, indeed, if it is really up to the job of “accelerating change” that is still urgently needed in every sector of the public service.

Before the puerile trading of desultory remarks kicks off in earnest, let me just throw in my view of the CPA.

Firstly, I actually do believe that it has delivered some savings and I am even willing to believe, at least for now, that it might actually full-fill its original aims by 2014. However, this would be one of those situations where the end can't really be justified by the means.

Firstly, let's consider the go to method used by the state to save money in hard times; the hiring ban or, perhaps euphemistically, the recruitment moratorium. Though it is a very quick and easy way of stabilising costs, it is not a sustainable or even healthy course of action for any organisation because for any organisation to thrive, it must take in new blood. An extended hiring ban is not only extremely unfair to young people looking for work (we just love f**king over the youth, don't we) it's damaging as it removes the possibility of new ideas and fresh ways of doing things from entering the equation.

Moving on, we also have the method being employed to reduce numbers, honey dripped retirement. Everyone retires eventually, that's a given but what happens when people, many of whom are still more than able to work, are offered retirement early? Well the first answer is that it costs a hell of alot in lump sums and pensions but it also has the knock on effect that alot of knowledge and experience will be lost before it can be properly passed on. Of course, the solution to the latter is to rehire the said individuals with extortionate remuneration to do the jobs they had been doing before their pseudo-retirement.

Both of these approaches to saving money have one thing in common, they are hugely irresponsible actions. Can this course be sustained? Well, we shall see . . .

27061986a wrote: »

The Government reckon that they have saved €1.5 billion from the deal.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0613/body-to-announce-croke-park-agreement-savings.html


I cant see how this has been achieved. What do other people think?

What part of the independently verified report do you disagree with out of interest?

Again the big issue is reporting;

see table 3 and table 4 between 2011 and 2012, pay + pensions increased by 15m. No savings whatever for this year due to the higher retirement related costs.

Also no account taken of non payroll re-hiring, redeployment and re training costs.

No account of the extra social welfare element due to those taking voluntary redundancy.

Lot of gross savings being highlighted rather than net ones.

Time for our lazy journalists to stop believing the headline figures.

Simply spin

creedp wrote: »

I think though that it should berecognised that the Croke Park Deal was agreed on the basis that there would be a four year pay freeze after the 12-15% pay cuts, i.e. the pay cuts form part of the agreement.

I was interested in this context in the AIB announcement of a 2 year pay freeze following no pay cuts which Larry Broderick was very unhappy with saying that staff were being asked to pay for the mistakes of the bank! Where did I hear that before! AIB is effectively a state org and is completely bust ... somebody has to pay for this ..

I have to ask what is the definition of a pay freeze within the context of the CPA?
I ask as I am aware that incremental pay rises are still being given (and this is not a debate on the merit/demerit of incremental pay rises, merely stating a factual reality), then my definition of a pay freeze is very different to the CPA's definition of a pay freeze.

sarumite wrote: »

creedp wrote: »

I think though that it should berecognised that the Croke Park Deal was agreed on the basis that there would be a four year pay freeze after the 12-15% pay cuts, i.e. the pay cuts form part of the agreement.

I was interested in this context in the AIB announcement of a 2 year pay freeze following no pay cuts which Larry Broderick was very unhappy with saying that staff were being asked to pay for the mistakes of the bank! Where did I hear that before! AIB is effectively a state org and is completely bust ... somebody has to pay for this ..

I have to ask what is the definition of a pay freeze within the context of the CPA?
I ask as I am aware that incremental pay rises are still being given (and this is not a debate on the merit/demerit of incremental pay rises, merely stating a factual reality), then my definition of a pay freeze is very different to the CPA's definition of a pay freeze.

A foregoing of the agreed pay increases under Towards 2016. The CPA has frozen the salary scales but not the ability to move up the scale

Public Sector pay has now crept back up above the 2008 level:

No, it has not. These figures do not include the pension levy.
The usual misleading misuse of statistics.

ardmacha wrote: »

No, it has not. These figures do not include the pension levy.
The usual misleading misuse of statistics.

And likewise the private sector numbers don't include pension figures either. It seems a valid comparison to me

ardmacha wrote: »

No, it has not. These figures do not include the pension levy. The usual misleading misuse of statistics.

Okay lets take it into account. It was introduced in March 2009, so would not affect most of Q1 2009:

Sector | 2008 Q1 | 2009 Q1 | 2010 Q1 | 2011 Q1 | 2012 Q1
Private | 642.54 | 631.82 | 612.46 | 610.71 | 619.74
Public | 904.80 | 934.00 | 832.75 | 830.99 | 847.81

Still 1/3 above private sector pay.

antoobrien wrote: »

ardmacha wrote: »

No, it has not. These figures do not include the pension levy. The usual misleading misuse of statistics.

Okay lets take it into account. It was introduced in March 2009, so would not affect most of Q1 2009:

Sector | 2008 Q1 | 2009 Q1 | 2010 Q1 | 2011 Q1 | 2012 Q1
Private | 642.54 | 631.82 | 612.46 | 610.71 | 619.74
Public | 904.80 | 934.00 | 832.75 | 830.99 | 847.81

Still 1/3 above private sector pay.

The figures are of little value in any case. It is comparing 386,000 public sector workers with 1,100,000 private sector workers. There is no analysis of age, length of service, qualifications, professional skills etc.

Not everyone in the private sector pays towards a pension so the easiest thing to do is to leave out the pension arrangements altogether.

I agree. However the pension levy is not a pension contribution.
This is supposed to be a serious forum, why do people keep on coming back making the same erroneous and misleading points again and again?

What's a pension levy?

Why don't you read some of the many threads on the subject and educate yourself?

ardmacha wrote: »

I agree. However the pension levy is not a pension contribution.
This is supposed to be a serious forum, why do people keep on coming back making the same erroneous and misleading points again and again?

While I agree with the fact that the pension levy is not a pensions payment, there are serious questions about the sustainability of DB's penions in general.

The reality is the majority of private sector workers would not have the same pension arrangements as the public sector (especially for the younger generation) and the payscales would not reflect this either.