Apparently the 15 per cent cut wasn’t fair. Fair? When did fair suddenly enter into the equation?
SILLY ME. I thought if we could crawl as far as Christmas Day, we could curl up in front of the fire and eat and sleep for 10 days. Thus restored, we could face into 2010 and the next round of the fight. We finished the pudding, but 2009 hadn’t finished with us. The news about Brian Lenihan’s illness was the final terrible blow of an awful year.
Despite the fact that he has delivered nothing but bad news and pushed through policies that vary from harsh to high risk, everyone likes him. Though on occasion we are unsure of his policies, we are sure of his integrity. During these bad times, it is a source of comfort. We are desperately sad for the Lenihans, the most likeable and decent of families, and they are in our thoughts and prayers.
But if the man who kept the European Central Bank on board, who persuaded the markets we weren’t Iceland, who told the unions to bugger off and who stood between us and the International Monetary Fund is sick, then we must know. TV3 screwed it up, but the Government must take some responsibility. Leo Varadkar said he heard the rumours in Christmas week, so if he knew, then a lot of people did.
If the Minister’s health was the subject of gossip among the political and media elite and since it has been beaten into us all year that we mustn’t go frightening the international markets with bad behaviour, then the situation called for more management than keeping one’s fingers crossed.
Lack of privacy is a high price to pay for high office but there is no shortage of precedents. In a direct parallel, the Japanese finance minister was admitted to hospital on Sunday suffering from high blood pressure and exhaustion. He was in hospital at 10am and a full statement on his condition and expected treatment issued that evening. I know it’s against all our protective instincts towards a family in crisis, but this is how things are done.
We will support the Minister whether he wants to keep working throughout his treatment and give him all the time and privacy he needs to make that decision.
But while he’s doing that, it’s our obligation to keep our eye on the ball. I’m reminded of Naomi Klein’s theory of “Shock Doctrine”. She argues that when a nation is in shock over a reaction to a disaster, policies to which we’d object in calmer days are slipped through.
In Christmas week a major policy reversal was introduced and the genuine shock of Lenihan’s news mustn’t be used to allow it to pass. On December 23rd, when perhaps some hoped no one would notice, a press release was issued from the Department of Finance revealing that just one of the cutbacks made in the Budget would be reversed. There were many hard cases from which to choose: the disabled, the carers, community projects and the low-paid. Which one created such tears and lamentations that the Cabinet was moved to right the wrong?
Why, the pay cuts for senior civil servants, of course. The 15 per cent pay cut for those earning over €200,000 was cut. The 12 per cent pay cut for those earning between €165,000 and €200,000 was also cut. To what figure was the cut, ahem, cut? To between 3 and 5 per cent. A miserable 3 per cent from a couple of hundred grand? Why?
Apparently the 15 per cent cut wasn’t fair. Fair? When did fair suddenly enter into the equation? None of this is fair. It’s not fair that my children will be paying for the bank recapitalisation. It’s not fair to learn that in the prime of your life you’ve got cancer.
The department mumbled about the loss of performance-related bonuses and “anomalies” where senior staff might end up being paid less than someone underneath them. I know where I’d shove their anomalies.
The excuses boil down to the point I’ve made in this column before – the top priority at all times is to preserve the final salary level of senior public servants so that the massive defined-benefit, uncuttable pensions will be protected. It is the most extraordinary outrage that these people, who issue orders for welfare and public service cuts, spare themselves on the grounds of fairness.
This cannot stand. This must not stand.
The decision was approved by Cabinet in the week Brian Lenihan was receiving his diagnosis. If this was a collective decision, they can collectively cop themselves on.
This is yet another sign of the institutionalisation of a long-standing party of government, so dependent on the “Sir Humphreys” that they are too quick to identify and sympathise with their unelected colleagues. The danger now is that anyone who opposes the policy reversal will be accused of exploiting the Minister’s illness, when in fact the opposite is the case. The Minister is entitled to his privacy, but his moment of weakness must not be ours.