CPSU criticises growing gulf in public service pay

Lower-paid civil servants have said across-the-board percentage increases and the requirement for additional productivity measures would be unacceptable outcomes from forthcoming talks on pay restoration with the Government.

Speaking at its annual conference in Killarney, the general secretary of the Civil Public and Services Union (CPSU) Eoin Ronayne said introducing a flat-rate payment for all public sector workers regardless of grade " was the only just and fair way to restore pay".

He said a percentage increase could not address commitments set out in previous in agreements between the Government and trade unions to prioritise the lower paid.

Mr Ronayne strongy criticised the growing gulf in pay which emerged in recent years between the highest and the lowest paid in the public service.

“Between 1979 and 2009 the pay rate for the secretary general level 3 increased by 1,011 per cent compared with that of the clerical officer at just a little less than half or 529 per cent. Put another way the secretary general level 3 in 2009 was six times better paid than the clerical officer at the max while in 1979 he/she was only three and a half times better paid,” he said.

“Even with the austerity cuts including the Haddington Road agreement the sec gen (secretary general) 3 is up 837 per cent on 1979 compared with 529 per cent for the clerical officer that’s still four and a half times better off. Even after all the cuts the higher grades are still light years ahead of the base grade of public administrator in terms of salary increases.”

He said lower- paid public servants were left behind by the Celtic Tiger while “the higher grades in the public sector steamed ahead and any analysis of the cuts shows they are still way ahead”.

“They were the beneficiaries of the so-called right wing theory of ‘trickle down’ economics…pay the top loads more and the bottom will benefit in due course,” he said. “Well of course that didn’t happen in the private or public sector…and even in the era of austerity cuts it didn’t happen in reverse…the higher paid are still way higher paid and our job is to fight to close the pay gap…these forthcoming public service pay talks are the vehicle we must use.”

Mr Ronayne said he wanted to make it absolutely clear as far as the CPSU was concerned that the forthcoming pay restoration talks were are only welcome and valid “if they move to end the injustice of the pay gap”.

“We are not interested if that is not the goal and we will be out of there like a hare from a trap if their plan is otherwise. What is needed is a commitment over the next few years to reverse the trend of increasing higher pay at the expense of the lower paid through the use of mechanisms such as the flat rate increase.”

Mr Ronayne also ruled out accepting any new productivity measures inreturn for pay restoration.

He said his members had lost more than one fifth of their take-home pay in recent years as a result of cuts and additional taxes but had still delivered increased productivity and co-operated with reform under existing agreements.

“Government broke their side of the deal but we kept ours now the boot is on the other foot,” he added.