Croke Park II preliminary Talks started today

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 12:50PM

repsol wrote: »

When all the dole claimants here are on the UK rates,we can consider moving the PS to UK rates also.The taxes would also have to be brought into line with the (scrapping VRT for example) and other costs such as health insurance would have to be the same.You cannot chose the UK system on an A La Carte basis,you have to take the good with the bad.You want UK wages you have to have UK costs of living.

I would hazard a guess that your relative is not a UK public servant as the vast majority of them would be working at Christmas and would not have been able to go on a little holiday to engage in a little PS bashing over the Xmas dinner table.I hope you enjoyed Xmas with your family while many Gardai ,nurses,firemen,prison officers were unable to spend Xmas with their families as they had to work.I don't know if you have a job but if you do I am sure you are paid more than your equivalent in the UK.

The bleeding heart response once again. I bet every nurse, guard, fireman and prison officer got well rewarded for working and remember there are 500k people on the dole who a large % would love to be working over the christmas.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 12:59PM

Godge wrote: »

According to the CSO data average public sector pay in Ireland is 48k euros.

According to the Daily Mail average public sector pay in the UK is 28k sterling about 34k euros.

The pension levy and pension contributions in Ireland are higher, about 7% higher in pay terms, meaning for that comparison the Irish figure should be 93% of 48k which is about 44.5k.

34k is not nearly half of 44.5k so to answer your question, I do not concede the point.

There are other reasons to explain the difference but I am not going to get involved in this. I have never said that public service pay has not been cut.

I have made the following points and I stick by them. I have posted plenty of evidence about this as well.

- Public servants have made a greater contribution to cutting the deficit as they have seen pay cuts and pension levy as well as all the extra taxes that everyone pays.
- Some public servants are overpaid, some are underpaid and some are paid correctly following the cuts but I don't think there is anyone qualified enough on these boards to tell the difference.
- International comparisons are difficult because there are a number of differences in the structures of public sector pay in other countries. The pension levy is one example but there are others.
- Pay cuts in the public sector have been wider and deeper than those in the private sector, the CSO backs this up
- There is a huge amount of uniformed drivel on these boards and misinterpretation of information.

Not to forget to included the increase for the 3/4 years of annual increments as well in the mean time?

itzme · 21-01-2013 01:02PM

fliball123 wrote: »

The bleeding heart response once again.

Ah come on now, if you're going to comment on someone not addressing the points and using the "bleeding heart response" at least try not to do the same in the same post

fliball123 wrote: »

remember there are 500k people on the dole who a large % would love to be working over the christmas.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 01:06PM

repsol wrote: »

Lot of haters towards the Public Service on here.

Most will either

A)have applied many times unsuccessfully for Gardai ,Fire Brigade etc or not got enough points for nursing or teaching

B)not bothered applying for PS because they were in a better paid job at the time which has now gone pear shaped and are now kicking themselves

C)hate a particular public servant who nicked their wife/girlfriend and view the rest of us getting our pay cut as collateral damage

Or D a tax payer who sees the balence of cuts vs spend and our government borrowing 2 million an hour to pay ps services, pay, pensions and social welfare and has seen 5 years of increase in taxation both direct and indirect, whilst seeing a group being sheilded from the cuts which force our kids into over crowded classes in prephabs, our old dying and get less help due to cuts and our standard of living being eroded so that this cult like organisation can steer clear of cuts and infact demand that they keep their increases. Yeah its not just A, B or C there kid . I would hazard a guess that anyone asked to pay more which we are being asked for by tax increases and seeing the service diminish for that increase, whilst also seeing scandal after scandal come to to the fore would start to ask questions about whats happening.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 01:14PM

itzme wrote: »

Ah come on now, if you're going to comment on someone not addressing the points and using the "bleeding heart response" at least try not to do the same in the same post

Well if someone is goint to try and defend it using this I take issue with it. As I say its not as if they worked the xmas for free, they got at least double time for it.

ardmacha · 21-01-2013 01:17PM

I would hazard a guess that anyone asked to pay more which we are being asked for by tax increases and seeing the service diminish for that increase

It isn't rocket science. You are being asked to pay more taxes are not enough taxes are being collected, largely because of the loss of stamp duty and the larger number of people unemployed. Everyone in the public service has paid these taxes also and has "suffered" as much as you. Services are diminishing because the country is less well able to pay for them.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 01:21PM

ardmacha wrote: »

It isn't rocket science. You are being asked to pay more taxes are not enough taxes are being collected, largely because of the loss of stamp duty and the larger number of people unemployed. Everyone in the public service has paid these taxes also and has "suffered" as much as you. Services are diminishing because the country is less well able to pay for them.

Really we are now one of the higher payers of tax when taking direct and indirect taxes into account in the OCED and when the full property tax, water rates and further increases over the next year or 2 before we exit (hopefully) from the the bailout we will be up near the very top. How much blood do you want from this stone? Also the reason isnt because of loss of stamp duty it is because when we were collecting so much stamp duty our expenditure side exploded during this period. Its not because we are not paying enough its because we are spending too much . as figures pointed out the expenditure side has come down very little since 2008

road_high · 21-01-2013 01:26PM

fliball123 wrote: »

Really we are now one of the higher payers of tax when taking direct and indirect taxes into account in the OCED and when the full property tax, water rates and further increases over the next year or 2 before we exit (hopefully) from the the bailout we will be up near the very top. How much blood do you want from this stone? Also the reason isnt because of loss of stamp duty it is because when we were collecting so much stamp duty our expenditure side exploded during this period. Its not because we are not paying enough its because we are spending too much . as figures pointed out the expenditure side has come down very little since 2008

Absolutely. Nail on head here. And getting such poor value then for what we are actually spending.

ardmacha · 21-01-2013 01:35PM

Really we are now one of the higher payers of tax when taking direct and indirect taxes into account in the OCED and when the full property tax, water rates and further increases over the next year or 2 before we exit (hopefully) from the the bailout we will be up near the very top

Is this merely your opinion or can you direct us to actual statistics on this matter?

as figures pointed out the expenditure side has come down very little since 2008

Expenditure on pay in the public services has come down substantially. If overall expenditure has not reduced then it because other expenditures have increased.

And getting such poor value then for what we are actually spending.

There is no doubt that much public expenditure was poor value, this is improving.

noodler · 21-01-2013 01:51PM

ardmacha wrote: »

Is this merely your opinion or can you direct us to actual statistics on this matter?

Source of much debate this. According to Eurostat (and based on Total Gove Revenue % GDP) we are 35%. Certainly one of the lowest in the Eurozone.

However, in most countries their GDP=thier GNP/GNI but not here. It would bring us well above average if we usd GNP.

Those figures are for 2011 though and so don't take into account the property tax and water charges (although I do not even know if water charges paid to 'Irish Water' will be included as Government revenue. On the same point, rates in the UK include your refuse collection IIRC and so the annual charge we pay to greyhound etc wouldn't show up in General Goverment Revenue).

ardmacha wrote: »

Expenditure on pay in the public services has come down substantially. If overall expenditure has not reduced then it because other expenditures have increased.

An important point.

Spending on stuff we cannot control has increased (increments and pension costs, national debt interest, promissory note payments, rising unemployment protection etc).

kippy · 21-01-2013 02:02PM

noodler wrote: »

This is in addition to increments of course. SOME Workers in the PS have recieved incremental salary increases since 2008.

?? If you have a point to make - then make it specifically rather than throw about open-ended questions.

I have already provided you with figures and a report which you seemed to know nothing about.

The report that "I knew nothing about" merely points out that there has been a substantial cut to the pay and pensions bill.

Some workers in the PS have received increments, not all.

The point is, the report outlines a 4% decline in the gross wage bill,
My point is that substantially more has been saved in the net pay bill.

The overall point is that the net cost of paying the wages and pensions of public sector workers has decreased substantially over the past 4-5 years.

(Adding that it should come down some more in targeted areas and not forgetting the points I made earlier in the thread)

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 02:07PM

ardmacha wrote: »

Is this merely your opinion or can you direct us to actual statistics on this matter?

Expenditure on pay in the public services has come down substantially. If overall expenditure has not reduced then it because other expenditures have increased.

There is no doubt that much public expenditure was poor value, this is improving.

The figures on tax has been done to death when taking in what we will be paying with upcoming taxes we will be near the top of the table. Sorry the overall pay and pensions bill has not come down that significantly since 2008 and regardless of where the expenditure is it cannot be afforded the tax side cannot continue to go up and not see any savings on the other side.

kippy · 21-01-2013 02:20PM

fliball123 wrote: »

The figures on tax has been done to death when taking in what we will be paying with upcoming taxes we will be near the top of the table. Sorry the overall pay and pensions bill has not come down that significantly since 2008 and regardless of where the expenditure is it cannot be afforded the tax side cannot continue to go up and not see any savings on the other side.

It's come down 4% since 2008 without taking into account the real cost of paying public sector pay and pensions.
(PAYE, PRSI and USC)

noodler · 21-01-2013 02:22PM

kippy wrote: »

The report that "I knew nothing about" merely points out that there has been a substantial cut to the pay and pensions bill.

Some workers in the PS have received increments, not all.

The point is, the report outlines a 4% decline in the gross wage bill,
My point is that substantially more has been saved in the net pay bill.

The overall point is that the net cost of paying the wages and pensions of public sector workers has decreased substantially over the past 4-5 years.

(Adding that it should come down some more in targeted areas and not forgetting the points I made earlier in the thread)

Well the report says 4% in NET paybill since 2007.

If we choose 2008 as the starting point (as it is the peak) then the figure is closer to 10%.

Worth noting as usual though that the p&p bill doubled in the 00s from 9bn to 18bn and that a huge portion of the savings in the pay bill are from various redundancy schemes and moratorium (and in a very very minor way to the 10% pay cut for new entrants).

Some areas will have been hit worse than others with regards the redundancies in terms of extra workload, and I am not taking that away from them, but when the original Croke Park Agreement was signed it was my initial understanding that the savings made would be in addition to those made from the salaries associated with redundancies.

I have never completely agreed that some areas of the PS which were overstaffed or had people in positions which were no longer needed could see such people retire and then claim the saving on their wage as a saving attributed to the CPA (1).

Paulzx · 21-01-2013 02:25PM

fliball123 wrote: »

r got well rewarded for working and .

Eh...Thats the whole point of working.......reward.

Do you work for free?

kippy · 21-01-2013 02:31PM

noodler wrote: »

Well the report says 4% in NET paybill since 2007.

If we choose 2008 as the starting point (as it is the peak) then the figure is closer to 10%.

Worth noting as usual though that the p&p bill doubled in the 00s from 9bn to 18bn and that a huge portion of the savings in the pay bill are from various redundancy schemes and moratorium (and in a very very minor way to the 10% pay cut for new entrants).

Some areas will have been hit worse than others with regards the redundancies in terms of extra workload, and I am not taking that away from them, but when the original Croke Park Agreement was signed it was my initial understanding that the savings made would be in addition to those made from the salaries associated with redundancies.

I have never completely agreed that some areas of the PS which were overstaffed or had people in positions which were no longer needed could see such people retire and then claim the saving on their wage as a saving attributed to the CPA (1).

You've already stated, using a quote from the report that the NET figure used in that report does not take into account:
1. PAYE
2. PRSI
3. USC

(It's probably a very difficult calculation to make - although if the civil and public service ran of the same payroll it wouldnt be))

Surely you can see that PAYE, PRSI and USC has meant that the state gets back a lot more than it did in 2007/2008?
And that 4% does not tell the full picture (or close to it)

I'd agree with the rest of your post.

noodler · 21-01-2013 02:50PM

kippy wrote: »

You've already stated, using a quote from the report that the NET figure used in that report does not take into account:
1. PAYE
2. PRSI
3. USC

(It's probably a very difficult calculation to make - although if the civil and public service ran of the same payroll it wouldnt be))

Surely you can see that PAYE, PRSI and USC has meant that the state gets back a lot more than it did in 2007/2008?
And that 4% does not tell the full picture (or close to it)

I'd agree with the rest of your post.

Do you not think it is important as well to keep the gross figures in mind?

For example, in my controversial opinion, I regard the pension levy as an absolutely fair instrument to ensure that PS workers contribute more to a DB pension that is merely a pipedream to much of the population.

In this regard, I still consider you to earn 30,000 gross with the PS levy as a pension contribution (the Government must feel this way as well to some extent given they levied it on gross incomes rather than simply reduce gross incomes).

That might have come across muddled but in essence I think it is important that we keep gross salaries in mind.

kippy · 21-01-2013 02:55PM

noodler wrote: »

Do you not think it is important as well to keep the gross figures in mind?

For example, in my controversial opinion, I regard the pension levy as an absolutely fair instrument to ensure that PS workers contribute more to a DB pension that is merely a pipedream to much of the population.

In this regard, I still consider you to earn 30,000 gross with the PS levy as a pension contribution (the Government must feel this way as well to some extent given they levied it on gross incomes rather than simply reduce gross incomes).

That might have come across muddled but in essence I think it is important that we keep gross salaries in mind.

I believe the net figures mentioned in the report stating a 4% saving in the pay and pensions bill DOES take into account payments towards pensions (based on what it says in the report)
But DOESNT take into account ANY portion of PAYE, PRSI and USC.

I agree, you should contribute to your pension and yes, the pension levy was needed to up this contribution (along with the other contributions towards pensions and portion of PRSI that goes towards a public sector workers pension as well)

The reason why, for this particular conversation, the net cost to the state of paying the wages of public sector pay and pensioners is the key figure is, I would have thought, obvious.

Gumbo · 21-01-2013 03:17PM

fliball123 wrote: »

remember there are 500k people on the dole who a large % would love to be working over the christmas.

Agh, the bleeding heart response again :rolleyes:

road_high · 21-01-2013 03:20PM

kceire wrote: »

Agh, the bleeding heart response again :rolleyes:

No...that is actually reality!

itzme · 21-01-2013 03:21PM

fliball123 wrote: »

Well if someone is goint to try and defend it using this I take issue with it. As I say its not as if they worked the xmas for free, they got at least double time for it.

I can understand why you would take issue if you viewed someone going with the bleeding heart response.
I was "taking issue" with the obvious hypocrisy of giving out to someone for a bleeding heart response and then giving one yourself in the same post.

Gumbo · 21-01-2013 03:22PM

mfitzy wrote: »

No...that is actually reality!

In your opinion

road_high · 21-01-2013 03:23PM

kceire wrote: »

In your opinion

As is yours.

itzme · 21-01-2013 03:26PM

noodler wrote: »

Do you not think it is important as well to keep the gross figures in mind?

For example, in my controversial opinion, I regard the pension levy as an absolutely fair instrument to ensure that PS workers contribute more to a DB pension that is merely a pipedream to much of the population.

In this regard, I still consider you to earn 30,000 gross with the PS levy as a pension contribution (the Government must feel this way as well to some extent given they levied it on gross incomes rather than simply reduce gross incomes).

That might have come across muddled but in essence I think it is important that we keep gross salaries in mind.

There was a post from sarumite not soo long ago mentioning gross and net and how they can and are abused on these forums (not in any way claiming you are).

My own view is that both are needed for any discussion with pay.
I think most people view the gross as the most important figure in relation to PS pay and pensions, personally I think net pay plus pensions reflects the actual government expenditure. Gross pay plus pensions is a headline figure. The gross wage of workers is important for comparison with the private sector but when dealing with savings made from cuts/redundancies the total net figure more accurately reflects the savings.

The pension levy is a perfect case in point, irrespective of anyones view on its usefulness/necessity/fairness it does achieve a saving that is only evident in the net savings.

kippy · 21-01-2013 03:31PM

itzme wrote: »

There was a post from sarumite not soo long ago mentioning gross and net and how they can and are abused on these forums (not in any way claiming you are).

My own view is that both are needed for any discussion with pay.
I think most people view the gross as the most important figure in relation to PS pay and pensions, personally I think net pay plus pensions reflects the actual government expenditure. Gross pay plus pensions is a headline figure. The gross wage of workers is important for comparison with the private sector but when dealing with savings made from cuts/redundancies the total net figure more accurately reflects the savings.

The pension levy is a perfect case in point, irrespective of anyones view on its usefulness/necessity/fairness it does achieve a saving that is only evident in the net savings.

Indeed, I was part of those conversations.
For the purposes of cost savings to the state the net paybill is the key cost involved. Not the gross. It's very obvious why this should be the case.

For comparisions on a profession by profession basis, gross should be used.

Gumbo · 21-01-2013 03:33PM

mfitzy wrote: »

As is yours.

I didn't offer an opinion

road_high · 21-01-2013 03:42PM

kceire wrote: »

Agh, the bleeding heart response again :rolleyes:

You said what a previous poster had said re Xmas working was a "bleeding heart response"....if that's not an opinion, I dunno what is.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 03:43PM

Paulzx wrote: »

Eh...Thats the whole point of working.......reward.

Do you work for free?

No I dont but I dont go on about it saying how tough it is and how terrible it is that I have to work over the xmas when there are so many out of work and pointing out that the rates for xmas working for the ps is very very generous.

fliball123 · 21-01-2013 03:44PM

kceire wrote: »

Agh, the bleeding heart response again :rolleyes:

Its not bleeding heart its fact...

noodler · 21-01-2013 03:46PM

kippy wrote: »

Indeed, I was part of those conversations.
For the purposes of cost savings to the state the net paybill is the key cost involved. Not the gross. It's very obvious why this should be the case.

For comparisions on a profession by profession basis, gross should be used.

I think we have to keep in mind both figures.

I mean we don't (or didn't) publish health spending net of the Health Levy, and we don't publish spending on social welfare net of PRSI contributions.

For one it is standard international practice for any international comparison.

Croke Park II preliminary Talks started today

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