Pay increases for senior public servants unlikely to go ahead

Pay increases for the most senior public servants scheduled for the start of July are unlikely to go ahead, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has indicated.

The pay increases due on July 1st are the last phase of the restoration of pay cuts for public servants dating from the time of the financial crisis.

Speaking in the Dáil on Tuesday, Mr Martin said the Government was “examining potential options around how and when this final element of restoration will be implemented”.

He added: “As restoration is provided for in legislation, this will require careful consultation with the Office of the Attorney General.”

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According to two senior sources with knowledge of the matter, the Government will seek to avoid paying the promised restoration of salaries, which were reduced during the financial crisis more than a decade ago.

As the date for salary restoration is in primary legislation, this will require further legislation postponing the payments to be passed by the Oireachtas before July.

The public servants affected are those paid more than €150,000 a year, including judges, senior civil servants and, significantly, hospital consultants.

The Department of Public Expenditure declined to say the extent of the pay restoration in question, but it is understood to be as much as 10-15 per cent of salary. Many of the salaries are in excess of €200,000 a year.

This week the Taoiseach told the Dáil that the top official in his department is paid €215,000, while the salary of a High Court judge is €196,000 a year. Salaries of hospital consultants vary depending on the type of contract they work under.

Promises

However, doctors’ representatives have warned the Government not to break its promises on restoring their pay. Senior officials are nervous about this as talks between the Department of Health and consultants’ organisations on a new contract – considered essential for the Sláintecare reforms of the health service – stalled before Christmas, and remain deadlocked.

Sources say the consultants are unlikely to agree a new contract while the Government is planning to abandon previous commitments to them.

On Tuesday night, a spokesman for the Irish Medical Organisation said: “The fact that the Government is even considering reneging on their commitments on this issue is doing incalculable damage to the already strained reputation of the health services here...It cannot be stressed enough that the Government must honour existing agreements if is to attempt to negotiate new ones.”

Instead of making the salary restoration, the Government intends to establish a review of the pay rates and the mechanism for appointing senior officials. The move was mooted by Minister for Public Expenditure Michael McGrath in recent weeks, but the Taoiseach’s intervention earlier this week is seen as confirmation of the Government’s intentions.

Senior sources said that with cost of living pressures growing it would be politically impossible to grant significant pay rises to the best-paid public servants in the country.