Can civil servants actually be sacked?

Wanderer2010 · 20-01-2013 11:21AM #1

I have a few friends in the public sector and when talk comes to job conditions etc Im always amazed by a common theme- that civil servants effectively cannot be sacked, no matter how poor they perform. One of my mates works with a woman who is always on the internet and whenever she does any work, she almost always screws it up and it has to repeated again. Anytime she is spoken to about it she claims bullying and threatens the boss with the union and they back down..

Does anyone know if any civil servants they work with have ever been sacked for poor performance? I presume it doesnt say in their contracts "you can never be dismissed" so the perception of never being sacked comes from either the long and overly complex disciplinary procedures or some long out of date employment law. Thoughts?

delta_bravo · 20-01-2013 11:22AM

Yes they can

Lumbo · 20-01-2013 11:35AM

Public Servants are subject to the same Employment Laws as any other employee.

/thread

tenton · 20-01-2013 11:36AM

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

I have a few friends in the public sector and when talk comes to job conditions etc Im always amazed by a common theme- that civil servants effectively cannot be sacked, no matter how poor they perform. One of my mates works with a woman who is always on the internet and whenever she does any work, she almost always screws it up and it has to repeated again. Anytime she is spoken to about it she claims bullying and threatens the boss with the union and they back down..

Does anyone know if any civil servants they work with have ever been sacked for poor performance? I presume it doesnt say in their contracts "you can never be dismissed" so the perception of never being sacked comes from either the long and overly complex disciplinary procedures or some long out of date employment law. Thoughts?

A good friend in a local governmenmt office has a team of 14 people. He says a third of them are great workers, careful and hard-working. A third do just enough to muddle through. The other third deliberately screw up any task they are given , so one of the others has to go and repair the damage done. They do that to ensure they are given as few tasks as possible to do. The worst "third" are also incredibly slow. Yet they cannot be fired.

dingding · 20-01-2013 11:41AM

The issue is that for employees before 2002 but I am open to correction on the year, they can only be sacked by the minister. The later employees can be sacked by the organisation the work for but again the decision has to be sanctioned at a very high level.

Because of the hassle involved in sacking people generally that are not sacked for performance issues.

meathstevie · 20-01-2013 11:42AM

Of course, Public and Civil servants can be sacked...try to report for duty pissed as fart in the army a few times or the Gardai, assault someone in the Dublin City Council offices or the local Revenue office etc etc. You won't be too long finding your behind on the cobbles.

Procrastastudy · 20-01-2013 11:52AM

One issue is that constitutional fair procedures apply with greater force to public sector workers. Disciplinary hearings are conducted much like a court and their decisions are, if I'm not mistaken, subject to judicial review.

Yes they can be sacked but to say it's as easy as it is in the private sector is somewhat misguided, as is the notion that all public sector workers are well paid, lazy donkey-bonnets. The bottom end of the PS is getting as screwed as the rest of us (just with more holidays). It's the top end of the PS as with the private sector that needs to be looked at.

Paulzx · 20-01-2013 11:53AM

tenton wrote: »

A good friend in a local governmenmt office has a team of 14 people. He says a third of them are great workers, careful and hard-working. A third do just enough to muddle through. The other third deliberately screw up any task they are given , so one of the others has to go and repair the damage done. They do that to ensure they are given as few tasks as possible to do. The worst "third" are also incredibly slow. Yet they cannot be fired.

Well the fault is with your "friend" then. If he hasn't got the balls or management skills to extract the optimum performance from his staff or is incapable of disciplining them well then he should be sacked.

Personally, I gave up on my imaginary friends when i was a kid

Lumbo · 20-01-2013 11:54AM

tenton wrote: »

A good friend in a local governmenmt office has a team of 14 people. He says a third of them are great workers, careful and hard-working. A third do just enough to muddle through. The other third deliberately screw up any task they are given , so one of the others has to go and repair the damage done. They do that to ensure they are given as few tasks as possible to do. The worst "third" are also incredibly slow. Yet they cannot be fired.

They can be fired. Your "good friend" is obviously incapable of following the disciplinary procedure.

Lumbo · 20-01-2013 11:58AM

Procrastastudy wrote: »

One issue is that constitutional fair procedures apply with greater force to public sector workers. Disciplinary hearings are conducted much like a court and their decisions are, if I'm not mistaken, subject to judicial review.

Yes they can be sacked but to say it's as easy as it is in the private sector is somewhat misguided, as is the notion that all public sector workers are well paid, lazy donkey-bonnets.

Are you referring to specific areas of the Public Sector? I've been involved in many dismissal cases in both Public/Private sector and there is very little difference in the process.

Procrastastudy · 20-01-2013 12:02PM

Lumbo wrote: »

Are you referring to specific areas of the Public Sector? I've been involved in many dismissal cases in both Public/Private sector and there is very little difference in the process.

There shouldn't be that much difference between the PS and a good private sector employer. That said many private employers would not allow cross examination of witnesses or the employee to be represented by counsel, which are possible in the PS.

A private sector disciplinary would only lead to EAT where as PS can lead to judicial review in the high-court, if I'm not mistaken.

EDIT: to clarify my point; I think the perception stems from, even the worst ran PS disciplinary process is going to be better than the average private sector one. To be fair that's not an indictment so much on the PS as it is on the private sector. There is also the fact that the PS is highly unionised where as alot of private employers are not - again not a dig at the PS.

As for specific sectors no - put it does always seem to be prison officers!

Manach · 20-01-2013 12:57PM

Offhand from various statistics from the various Employment appeals boards, much more cases were brought by the Public than Private sector workers on points of law. This might be due to the greater degree of Union membership which in turn provides support during this process.

Tails142 · 20-01-2013 01:04PM

Know of a few people who have been sacked but it's normally due to drinking problems, not turning up or showing up drunk etc. It's a bit sad because one of the guys i know drank himself to death just before Christmas after being let go.

mikemac1 · 20-01-2013 01:08PM

tenton wrote: »

A good friend in a local governmenmt office has a team of 14 people. He says a third of them are great workers, careful and hard-working. A third do just enough to muddle through. The other third deliberately screw up any task they are given , so one of the others has to go and repair the damage done. They do that to ensure they are given as few tasks as possible to do. The worst "third" are also incredibly slow. Yet they cannot be fired.

That doesn't say much about the management ability of your friend.

Avoiding conflict and looking for the easy life.

Which is fair enough but if he wants to change his team or his teams attitude the procedures are there, he just chooses not to use them

RATM · 21-01-2013 03:42PM

meathstevie wrote: »

Of course, Public and Civil servants can be sacked...try to report for duty pissed as fart in the army a few times or the Gardai, assault someone in the Dublin City Council offices or the local Revenue office etc etc. You won't be too long finding your behind on the cobbles.

Fari enough with the Guards and the Army. But I used to work in a pub just a few doors down from the offices of several hundred civil servants and I can confirm that a good few of them were frequently pissed at work.

There is an early house in Smithfield and if you go in there on any weekday morning you can see civil servants drinking before they go into work.

If you are an alcoholic in the civil service you are in the safest place possible. You'll get endless years of sympathy even if you don't give up the drink. You just won't be fired.

shar01 · 21-01-2013 04:11PM

RATM wrote: »

Fari enough with the Guards and the Army. But I used to work in a pub just a few doors down from the offices of several hundred civil servants and I can confirm that a good few of them were frequently pissed at work.

There is an early house in Smithfield and if you go in there on any weekday morning you can see civil servants drinking before they go into work.

If you are an alcoholic in the civil service you are in the safest place possible. You'll get endless years of sympathy even if you don't give up the drink. You just won't be fired.

I know of several people in the public service with drink problems who have been subject to disciplinary proceedings and who have been sacked. Their employer gave them every opportunity to sort themselves out.

Chemical Burn · 21-01-2013 04:14PM

They probably can but employers / bosses / managers fear backlash from unions

shar01 · 21-01-2013 04:24PM

Chemical Burn wrote: »

They probably can but employers / bosses / managers fear backlash from unions

There can be no backlash - once proper procedure is followed. Even the most rabid Trotskyite could not find fault.

srsly78 · 21-01-2013 04:34PM

I have read that they can be fired for gross misconduct, however that's it. Can't have any compulsory redundancies, so can't fire those who do nothing (coz that isn't gross misconduct it seems).

Wishbone Ash · 21-01-2013 06:20PM

Regardless of the general theme of the thread, these two points stand out for me.

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

a woman who is always on the internet

As a start, why hasn't her manager arranged to switch off her internet access? If she requires the internet as part of her work, why isn't it restricted to what she requires?

(I'm a senior manager in the Public Service and my internet service is excessively limited. Out of our staff of approx 500, I only know of 2 that have unrestricted internet access).

Wanderer2010 wrote:

threatens the boss with the union

Why would a manager heed such threats? I've sat on both sides of the table in union related matters and in my experience trade unions have very little interest in representing incompetent staff. Whenever such a threat is made to me I welcome it. Most union representatives seek an "off the record" chat with a manager prior to representing anyone as naturally they wish to know what they're heading in to. The "threat" quickly evaporates.

It's the same for allegations of "bullying". It's fairly easy to switch that around to show that the employee is the one doing the "bullying".

Can civil servants actually be sacked?

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