Civil servants to ballot on pay system

A revolt by lower-ranking civil servants against a new performance evaluation system is set to come to a head with a ballot on the issue next month.

Arrangements for the ballot have been instigated by the Civil, Public and Services Union following angry exchanges about the issue at its annual conference earlier this month.

Delegates to the conference voted overwhelmingly to condemn the union's executive for agreeing to the new evaluation system in the first place.

A decision to formally reject the new system in a ballot, however, could result in CPSU members being denied national pay increases.

This is because unions are already committed to implementation of the Performance Management and Development System (PMDS) under national partnership agreements.

An extension of the scheme, linking it to the payment of increments and to promotions, was agreed under the most recent programme, Sustaining Progress.

Negotiations on its detailed implementation last year resulted in a system under which a civil servant's performance can be given a rating of between "one" and "five" by management.

A minimum score of "two" is necessary to qualify for increments, and "three" to be eligible for promotion.

CPSU general secretary Blair Horan told the union's conference that there were built-in protections to ensure the scheme was not abused by managers.

Delegates claimed in response, however, that the system could result in members losing increments. They passed a motion calling for a ballot on the scheme within two months.

In a circular issued late last week to branch secretaries, Mr Horan said the matter would be considered at the next meeting of the union's executive, on April 27th. But he said a ballot would be likely to take place in May, in order to meet the terms of the conference motion.

Mr Horan said negotiations on the linkage of the evaluation system with increments and promotions had begun in 2004 and only concluded in May 2005.

"It was the unanimous view of the negotiating team of the four unions involved - CPSU, PSEU, Impact and AHCPS - that while the negotiations had been long and difficult, the outcome was satisfactory on all of the key issues and would not be improved by reference to third party arbitration," he said.