New public pay body won’t report until next summer

The new public service pay commission, which the Government hopes will go some way towards easing demands by State employees for pay increases, will not report until next summer, it has emerged.

Proposals to be brought to Cabinet today by Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe state that the new body will advise the Government rather than make decisions on pay.

As teachers and gardaí prepare for industrial action in the coming weeks, Ministers have continued to insist there will be no rowing back from the Lansdowne Road agreement on pay to which most public servants are signed up.

“Responsible government requires that we avail of the labour mechanisms of the State and work within the agreements people have signed up to,” a Government spokesman said.

The new commission will have seven members, including an independent chairperson. Under its expected terms of reference, the commission will look at the evolution of pay trends and make comparisons between public and private sectors, where possible.

Lobbying

It will be asked to make comparisons between rates of pay internationally where this is possible.

There has been intensive lobbying by trade unions and employers’ groups over the leadership and membership of the commission, with one union stressing to the Department of Public Expenditure that the chairperson of the group should not be a judge, but a person familiar with industrial relations issues. Another union said it “should not be packed with academics”.

The Cabinet will also be told that among the themes that emerged from a public consultation process on the new commission were that it should make fair comparisons and that a value should be placed on pensions available to public service staff. Data drawn up by the commission will be made public.

The Department of Public Expenditure is to publish the various submissions made as part of this public consultation process.

Consultants

The Irish Times

understands that the largest group of high-paid State employees, hospital consultants, urged the reversal of all cuts applied on them under financial emergency legislation after the economic crash and the full implementation of a contract agreed by the government in 2008 which offered salaries of up to €240,000 per year.

Fianna Fáil has said it will stand by the Lansdowne Road agreement, but Dara Calleary, the party’s spokesman on public expenditure, said a successor agreement must be in place when the current deal expires in September 2018. That would mean a new deal would have to be completed in less than a year in order for pay increases to be accounted for in Budget 2018.

“There must be no hiatus in dealing with this, and there must be a firm path towards pay recovery and pay restoration,” said Mr Calleary.

He also said that a lack of trust has developed between the Government and the unions over issues that could be dealt with outside the confines of the Lansdowne Road deal, such as Junior Cert reform.

Fianna Fáil has tabled a submission on the shape it wants the public sector pay commission to take. The establishment of the commission is part of its confidence and supply agreement with Fine Gael.