public sector unions want our support

Bayan

I must be mental getting in on this one, but just to get back to the title.... there's no way that the Unions will get private sector support for any further action. I work in the Public Sector (don't shoot!) and to be honest, it seems to me that there's a lot of people in the Pub.S who don't support the Unions either. Well, in fairness (anecdotal evidence warning) I don't have a permanent job, I'll be out on my ear at the end of a 3yr contract which finishes next year, and I know a LOT of people like me. I work in a building with 11 people working out of it and there are 2 people with permanent jobs there. I'm not in a Union and I didn't strike last month (don't shoot!) and I wouldn't have gone on strike even if I did have a permanent job. Reason being is, and I think there's quite a bit of this in the PS, we knew the cut was coming, and realise it had to happen and there's little point in feeding the anger any further. Understandably though, most people in the permanent jobs feel they should support the majority when the ballot happens. It ain't pretty when you break a strike, and I hated doing it.

I also used to work in a Semi-Sate (walked away from a permanent job as I didn't want to settle in for the next 30 years and only work in one organisation for the rest of my life) and I saw the nonsense that Unions go on with. I cannot take any of those people seriously when they were in bed with FF all these years, taking their nice little nixers on the boards of Fas, Central Bank etc. They absolutely do not represent me. And holding 'transformation' up as a carrot makes my blood boil, as if it was a gift of the Union. Most decent workers in the Pub S would love to see the end of a lot of the red tape bull, and dead wood around the place. There is a lot of it, no doubt in my mind. There are definitely people in the Pub. S who are institutionalised, hardly any wonder I suppose. I do think someone who survives for 40 years in the atmosphere of the average public/civil service admin type roles deserves a medal for not topping themselves years ago.

Obviously I'm not a 'pen pusher' but I'm not 'frontline' either and if I could have gone on strike for just frontline workers, then I would have. I know a lot of teachers, nurses etc. You could call me a product of the Public Service in fact, Nurse Mam, Guard Da. Ha. Naturally I'm predisposed to defending them a bit I suppose, but the vast majority of people in those jobs (and in lots of other roles in the Pub. S) really are in them to help people and provide a service. And believe me, it weren't no bed of roses being raised on a public service salary in the 80's.
Again, purely anecdotal, and I can see the live register figures every day like everybody else, but the pain in the private sector does seem to be principally concentrated on small businesses, hospitality (but we were being Ripped Off Royally lads) and anything to do with construction - architects, engineers, brickies etc. I know a lot of architects and they are absolutely being hammered. But the amount of architects in Ireland in 2007 was a nonsense, just as having 600 civil servants working in the Department of Health with nothing to do since the HSE was set up is a nonsense. One architect I know is really struggling and my heart breaks for him, but, he also owns a wedge of property in Poland, the UK, and Budapest and used to clear 200k up until last year. On the other hand, my sister applied for the redundancy package in her IT company, got it third time of asking and walked into a better paying gig three weeks later with a very decent lump sum from her old job. I also know someone who bailed on teaching in the public system last year and is a good bit better off this year. These stories are not to say that the private sector hasn't taken the harshest cuts, they're right behind the poor feckers on the dole in my view, but some of those people on the dole used to have a contract in the public system too. One I worked with had a one year contract renewed for 9 years. None of his colleagues in the Pub. S were out striking for him when his contract wasn't renewed - as an earlier poster pointed out - otherwise known as losing your job.

So, to finish, what would be really great, would be for the debate to resist the constant need to pore bile on Pub.S workers. For a good chunk of them, they work hard, are not overpaid and are willing to batton down the hatches, live on the basics for the foreseeable, accept the cuts within reason and are grateful for their jobs. Morale is naturally low, but I think the constant barrage of abuse by commentators is worse than the paycuts (both of them) for morale for the many in the public service who work over the hours prescribed, go the extra mile (a lot of teachers do do this you know) and do it because they actually believe in the idea of serving the public.
One more anecdote, I don't get paid overtime, but I do it all the time. I had 15 days of my allowance taken off me last year because I couldn't take them in time. I have no doubt the same will happen this year. And honestly, I'm not at all unique in our office. I also did the same thing in the semi-state job I used to have, and I was one of many there too. Not everyone is a layabout in the Pub. Service, so, yes, don't support their Unions ridiculous ideas, unpaid leave was a total joke, and private sector workers going on strike is another joke. But maybe lay off the vitriol for a while? And save it for NaNaMaNaNa..... Now there's a joke on ALL of us...

Capt'n Midnight

How many permanent jobs have been shed in the public sector so far ?
http://www.cso.ie/statistics/sasunemprates.htm
The 8% increase in unemployment has come from the private sector.

http://www.cso.ie/statistics/empandunempilo.htm
The number of people working in Public administration and defence;compulsory social security has gone up 5% in the last year :eek:

Public service has steadily climbed in recent years, yes there was a 1% drop recently, but a lot of that can be explained by people at retirement age bailing out before their pensions/conditions got cut. (some of these were teachers who then worked part time providing cover for their vacant position :rolleyes:)

When unions in the public sector talk about the pay cuts their members have taken so far compared to the private sector I don't hear them taking into account the % of private sector works who took a 100% cut. :mad:


The public sector signed up to benchmarking. In the private sector wages are down 20-30% compared to last year (gross payroll basis)


As for semi-state - they have been exposed to reality already, unlike the public sector.
how many jobs are An Post shedding ?
How many post offices have closed down over the years ?
What are the Irish Sugar / Irish Shipping workers doing these days ?




The Chinese call the public sector "the iron rice bowl" because you don't have to worry about where your next meal is coming from.

In the past the public service have reacted to pay freezes by bumping everyone up a grade :mad::mad:

kpbdublin

The public sector unions, very much part of the establishment in recent years, have to huff and puff a bit in order to justify their salaries.

Mayo Exile

I must have read thousands of posts at this stage (especially over in the Irish Economy forum) telling me how good pay and conditions of employment are in the public sector. So, there being an opposite to most things, conditions in the private sector must be like this then:

Monty Python - Poor

"Who would have thought thirty years ago we would all be sitting here drinking Chateau de {Chassiley?} wine, eh?"

"In them days, we were glad to have the price of a cup of tea."

"Aye, a cup of cold tea"

"Without milk or sugar"

"Or tea"

"In a filthy cracked cup."

"We never used to have a cup. We used to have to drink out of a rolled up newspaper."

"The best we could manage was a sock or a piece of damp cloth."

"But ye know, we were happy in those days, though we were poor ..."

"Because we were poor. My old Dad used to say to me 'Money doesn't buy you happiness'."

"He was right. I was happier then and I had nothing! We used to live in this tiny old house with great big holes in the roof."

"House, you lived in a house? We used to live in one room, all twenty-six of us, no furniture, half the floor was missing, and we're all huddled together in one corner for fear of falling."

"You were lucky to have a room! We used to have to live in the corridor!"

"Oooooh, we used to dream of living in a corridor. It would have been a palace to us. We used to live in an old water tank on a rubbish [heap]. We got woken up every morning to having a load of rotting fish dumped all over us. House? Uh!"

"Oh, when I said house I meant a hole in the ground covered by a piece of twig. It was a house to us."

"We were evicted from our hole in the ground. We had to go and live in the lake!"

"You were lucky to have a lake! There were a hundred and fifty of us living in a small shoebox in the middle of the road."

"Cardboard box?"

"Aye"

"You were lucky. We lived for three months in a brown paper bag in a septic tank. We used to have to get up at six in the morning, clean the bag, eat a crust of stale bread, go to work down the mill fourteen hours a day, week in, week out, and when we would go home, dad would thrash us to sleep with his belt."

"Look, [sherry?], we used to have to get out of the lake at three o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of hot gravel, go to work for twenty hours at the mill every day for a tuppence a month, come home, and dad would beat us around the head and neck with a broken bottle ... if we were lucky!"

"Well, we had it tough. We used to have to get up out of the shoebox at twelve o'clock at night, and lick the road clean with our tongues. We had one handful of freezing cold gravel, work at the mill for twenty-four hours a day for four bits every six years, and when would get home, our dad would slice into us with a bread knife."

"Right!"

"I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night, half an hour before I went to bed, eat a lump of dry poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down at the mill, and when we got home, our dad would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah!"

"You can't tell the young people of the day that. They won't believe you."

[Chorus of no's and nays]

All credits to the Monty Python players.

old geezer

I know lots of people in Public sector and most of them say there is very little support for any strike or work to rule action cos they know the real world of their friends and families in the private sector, the unions would be better off talking to Govt about reforms so more wage cuts won't be needed next year.

Pete M.

Why can't we all just row together?

That's what's needed along with a complete turn around with regard to how we consume.

If we were all in the public sector we'd all be in the 'Iron Rice Bowl'.

The time has come lads, throw out them Fianna Fail, Fine Gael, Labour, rich, privileged, Union Leader, boss types and start over.

I bagsies the Ministry of Entertainment......

And yes, btw, I back them to the hilt, being one of them, if the French and the Brits can do it then so can we. Strike until the country collapses, oh yeah, bring it on.....

speedboatchase

I love how only public sector workers bring up this "divide and conquer" master scheme from the govt :eek: by jove really?! Thanks for the tip, let's band together, except on wednesday's when I've to collect my dole

dresden8

Next year when you are complaining about being shafted by you employer and complaining about what your union are doing I will take particular delight in your discomfort. I shoud have started this **** a year ago for the private sector commandoes.

I think you'll find your loyal employeers think it's an imperitive when it comes to cutting costs but when it comes to science, we can afford to work it out.

Lying cnuts.

TCP/IP_King

opinion guy wrote: »

Yeah forget the public sector.

Semi-states for pay cuts anyone ? Not all of them. Don't think those under 30k should get cut (nor should the PSers under 30k). But come-on fair is fair if public sector get smacked semi-states shoudl too

Here we go.

Why not just go for broke and abolish the minimum wage legislation.
Oh wait, we're protected from all those looney Lisbon threats of €2 per hour by that legislation ... aren't we ??