Personally, I think that unsociable hours should be paid as standard wage + shift allowance.

If you work unsociable hours in any job this should be the case.

I notice none of the TDS allowances are being offered up.

Tomy, as it was well pointed out at the rally, in Australia, these premium payments are called penalty payments. Acknowledging that it is a penalty to have to work at these times.

Totally agree with Andrew here – maybe a cut could be negotiated if there were some examples of us all “being in it together” from the top.

As far as I can see I don’t see any TD’s/ex-TD’s/ex-taoisigh struggling to pay mortgage/heating bills/food.

Cut their pay, give them less holidays, make them work longer first and then come back to the table.

Wait Andrew, your going to benchmark all jobs against English salaries? Then the cuts will be a lot more severe to all front line staff pay won’t it? Someone who knows exactly step in here.

Conor, I can’t find any reliable statistics to hand, but I lived in the UK for 10 years, sometimes with nurses, and their headline salaries are very similar. An internet search suggested the same, but I too would be interested in the stats. Certainly, cost of living is lower in the UK. The point I was making was a wider one, though, which Paul picked up – we’ve had private sector workers taking 20 – 25% pay cuts, there have been job losses in both the private and public sector, but our elected representatives seem to think they are above sharing the pain. I don’t see how you can negotiate in good faith with a partner that bails out one section of society, then forces the costs of that on you while refusing to take any share of the pain itself.

If double pay is on offer for working Sundays and bank holidays, people will do the work to get the extra pay. If the pay is the same, people won’t turn up.
In the 1980s, when the country was in deep trouble, hours after the rostered hours were normally time-and-a-half, Sundays were double time, and Christmas Day was treble time.
(Then, too, if you were a casual worker, the employer you worked for first in a week paid your RSI for the week. And you were entitled to paid holiday time pro rata for hours worked, as a casual worker.)

It’s Obvious only Civil Servants and Public Sector workers have time to read The Journal.ie and Vote !

Yes @ Colin Mc Keown. I do have time today to vote…Cos Ill be slogging my guts for 13 hours all night tonight on a ward while Private Sector workers (majority) are nicely tucked away in their beds! Let up will ya!

Excuse me but can you tell us if are you paid by the state Mr McKeown?

@Stephanie Hudson were you forced to do the job that you are doing now? i don’t think so you are not the only person that does these shifts there are plenty of private sector that do the same hours and yes surprise surprise they work Christmas day also so don’t bleat at me at how unfair it is to be a public sector worker you made your choices in life as much as everybody else suck it up and move on. and don’t blame your choices on the private sector.

Very well put.
These people save our lives 24/7 & deserve every cent for unsociable hours, nights/sundays/bank holidays/christmas etc. and no i dont work in public sector.
TD’s earn stupid money , dont see them cutting their salaries as quick as they want to screw our brilliant nurses, firemen, paramedics, gardai etc.

Mike, most people would like to see nurses, gardai etc paid even MORE, but where do we get the money? And don’t say from the TDs or from the rich. How about a practical solution?

William, how about first off getting a REAL deal on our debt, someting that acuarately reflects the amount owed to gambling bondholders in Germany and France who have raped tens of billions out of our pockets. How about we stop giving away our 500 billion worth of natural resources for NOTHING!, not even a measly royalty cent. How about we land levies on inexcusable pensions for the undeserving TDs who landed us in this mess. How about we cut the numbers of county councillors, middle management bureacreacy who may do something, but i think Id prefer a nurse or garda or fire fighter rather than a pen pusher when Im in trouble. And then we could look at the rich and the current 166 sitting TDs, for an island of 4million!! The level of wastage in our administrations is obscene, the amount of money grabbing is criminal, and the actual competence of those who are in charge is frightning. Theres an incredible amount that could be done, correctly, if we have those with the balls and brains in positions of power , instead of failed country teachers who have spent most of their lives sitting on their arses complaining about the sytem, and when they get the chance, they do even worse than the crowd before!

There is little doubt the “deal” we are getting on our debt is as good as we can get. Do you think you could do better? Talk is cheap.

I’m a Capitalist/Free Market believer and I don’t think the public should ever bail out private companies like Anglo, BUT that’s not what the people want. They continuously vote in semi-socialist, populist parties that waste vast amounts of money. So they’re your friends not mine.

Your point about the resources is daft, in fact oil will drop in value because of Shale gas and other newly found sources. I’m sure again the government is getting as good a deal as they can, unless you want it left in the ground.

To disparage a “pen pusher” is to misunderstand how anything is run. You need pen pushers as much as nurses. An accountant is every bit as valuable as a nurse. My wife’s a nurse I might add. I’m a programmer. Am I useless? Is a Guard a far finer member of the species than me?

… and I said PRACTICAL. Getting rid of ALL TDs wouldn’t say enough to warrant the time I’ve wasted on this sentence.

William you’re a capitalist/free market believer. Look where that has landed the country. The free market was a bit too free wasn’t it? The free market broke the country and the public sector gets hammered for it.you constantly bring your comments back to the “sure we can’t afford the public sector wage bill” argument. That’s a bit hard to believe when it’s obvious that we can afford SOME of the public sector wage bills. We seem to have no problem affording politicians massive pensions (some on multiple pensions) the HSE management payments that seem to have just been given out like ice cream (reference articles in media today) and current politicians pay and allowances.. There’s no one saying that a guard is better than you William but the guard signed up for the hours and conditions with the knowledge that they would be paid for the horrible hours. The government now want to pay a whole lot less to the people working the most horrible hours in the country because they are an easy target. You being a free market capitalist will understand that if this happened in the private sector (say pharmaceutical operators) then the market may have problems finding good quality workers to do those hours. Not every private sector worker in the country have had wages and conditions cut. In fact some have had wage increases or at very least stayed level. Dunnes stores workers have in fact had pay increases recently. Just because the public sector is public should not mean they are targets

How do we know the deal we are getting is as good as we could get, when we didnt even ASK or INVESTIGATE any other possibilities accourding to the government. Could I have done bette/ I dont know, but i do know I would have at least looked every single one of them in the eye and told them ‘NO’, rather than kneel before them and kiss their German asses. And to blithly say that you are a capitalist but the rest of the population arent cause they keep voting in Socialist governments, so they must WANT to pay them back is completely turning a deaf ear and blind eye to what is a growing movement across the country. WE DONT WANT TO PAY THIS!! We voted in politicans who told us there was going to be not one more cent paid, that bond holders were to be burnt, that it was labours way. So we voted in what we were promised, what we wanted and we got slimy, lilly livered german lapdogs who cant even run a classroom let alone a cabinet.

I would suggest you research the deals done concerning the gas and oil resources and when you fully understand the impications for the taxpayer then tell me that that was the best deal this country could of gotten. Dont know you from Adam William, but to make a sweeping statement like that indicates that you are following party lines again, whos ever lines they may be. We have been screwed again by our politicians in regard to our reserves. And when we went to Norway and explained the deals to the ordinary people there they were gobsmacked. Our deals pay each man, woman and child in Norway several thousands for doing nothing. Yet Irish people get zilch.

I never disparaged any pen pushers. Ive said that i would prefer a nurse to a pen pusher. Im a pen pusher. Dont earn half of what the middle management in Civil Service do. And yet as a self employed individual I work 50% more hours than they do. So go on back to your programming, bitch about everything, snipe at the sensible suggestions made to bring the lower paid workers into a deserved income bracket and forget about any decent alternatives yourself. Typical comfortable irish citizen these days.

Mark, we know we are getting the best deal for the same reason you know your mechanic correctly fixed your car, your doctor has prescribed the correct medicine etc.. The civil servants and politicians dealing with the resources are not imbeciles.

All your semi racialist “German lapdog” hyperbole contributes nothing and isn’t worth replying to.

Jason, it’s not a free market. If it was Anglo would have gone bust and the shareholders and investors would have lost and no one else. When we nationalised the mess we put forward the exact opposite solution – a socialist/communist solution.

Your, “Horrible hours” statement, is meaningless. If you become a chef you work so called anti-social hours – so what?

william
Michael Noonan stated he didnt ask for a writeoff/writedown so your opening sentence is incorrect. who can tell what we could have gotten. and yes i think there are people who could have done better. Noonan had his own agenda, a bilderberg agenda.

@william
Jason, it’s not a free market. If it was Anglo would have gone bust and the shareholders and investors would have lost and no one else. When we nationalised the mess we put forward the exact opposite solution – a socialist/communist solution.
the solution was put forward by capitalists
why do you think this was as in my opinion they broke their own rules, why was that?

Absolutely Frank. The problem is you have people like William (who admittedly is not alone in his total gullibility with our wonderful administrators!!) who actually believe their statements. Imagine NOT negotiating on a debt that you promised your electorate that youd never pay!! What sort of imbiciles are we for believing in their promises of doing something different? These guys running our country arent just fools, theyre dangerous fools, causing heartache and anxiety across our society that is making some of our citizens feel that the only way out is to kill themselves. People who didnt spend excessivelt thorugh the boom time, who didnt run up large credit cards, second homes, second cars, multiple holidays, whos only crime was to believe a cowardly mayo schooltecher that he would fight for the irish man and woman against the European and World gamblers who saw fit to take a risk on our financial markets and who who forced us to cover their losses to protect their bigger agenda. Was there a better deal…Too damn right there was, and if he fought half as hard as he’d lied we wouldnt be voting in polls as to whether to cut pay on valuable services that we all need!!

regarding the free market
you can’t be a capitalist on monday then change to a communist tuesday and then revert back to being a capitalist for the rest of the week.
thats whats happening they are bending the rules to suit themselves and their agenda.
capitalism as we know it is dead, it has eaten itself

But William it is a free market. It’s a capitalist country with some socialist values. It’s an economy that’s based on Keynesian economics of supply and demand. I can assure you it’s a free market economy. The problem though William is that the safeguards that were put in place to prevent the faults of the free market (regulators and opposition politicians in fact) failed dismally. You can’t have it both ways. Shout for a free market and then slate the actions taken by a “socialist” government when your free market system fails dramatically. And like I said in a post further down, I know plenty if chefs paid extra for working late shifts.

There are plenty of alternatives to save the money sought by the Government. The problem is that for them many are politically unattractive and don’t seem to be on the same table as cuts to frontline workers.

A third tier of USC for workers earning in excess of 100k was mooted by Labour for BUdget 2012 but the Fine Gael party did not agree so the measure was not introduced. This would have been seen by most as a fair measure aimed at those who earn most but alas not for this country to ask the rich for more.

Tax on betting could be increased, since the austerity measures hit the betting shops seem to have seen a surge in activity with most premesis having a permanent punter holding up the door while having a well earn break from betting in the form of a fag break.

Wages of high earning civil servants need to be re-examined as well as those of our political masters. When a country of 5 million or so pays its top level civil servants wages in excess of the premiers of many of the largest nations in the western world there has to be something seriously wrong. County managers earning more than the PM of Spain, Garda Commissioner earning in excess of top London Met officer, Army chief of staff earns more than UK counterpart (and we have never the prospect of going to war).

We have a health system that is a financial black hole that we tried to fix with a bigger problem the HSE with too many well paid chiefs and not enough Indians. The boom times seems to have been ideal time to introduce extra layers of bureaucracy to all the arms of the civil service. The current government were all promises as to how they would improve the HSE but alas they too seem to be in the ‘Angola’ that Brain Cowan spoke of. Surely somebody can fix this system or are they afraid of the consultants more than the frontline workers.

Welfare costs almost 40% of Govt spend in Ireland and again this is a politically unpalatable source of cuts. No doubts any cuts here will be in child welfare which is propping up many low and middle income families from all sectors. A 2011 estimate of 57m for free tv licence, free electric scheme 180m, free telephone scheme make for frightening figures. Ghost medical cards cost between 65m and 210m each year according to a 2012 report.

We all know that tackling this as well as welfare fraud is something that could cost the govt votes and yes it will cost votes but as a society we need to ask what kind of a society do we want a welfare society that favours those who choose not to work and see having children as a means to increasing their overall income or a society that encourages people to work. During the boom a large number of the long term unemployed did not return to the workforce and real jobs were filled by migrants from outside mainly European countries as our people chose to continue receiving welfare. It was a lifestyle choice plain and simple. It is this cohort that daily fill up surgeries of doctors across the country and A+E waiting rooms with out a thought for the knock on effect. It is this cohort to a large extent that end up in our court systems and jails costing us even more on free legal aid and eventually keeping them in prison. The do gooders in society will tell us these people are the marginalized of society and didnt get enough rice crispies when they were young and we should feel sorry for them. It is also this cohort that are the most demanding with the public services with their attitude of “I am entitled to x, y and z” with ordinary decent people almost apologising for attending A&E, Garda Stations etc.

An unemployed father of eight was recently in a Mayo court and said he was on 700 p/week this did not include his childrens allowance of 1228 p/month giving this man in excess of 50k disposable income every year. This for doing absolutely nothing except reproducing and society foots the bill. Even without the childrens allowance how much would anybody have to earn to allow themselves to have a disposable income of 36k. It is also most probable that those who have a nett pay of 36k have mortgages and bills to such an extent that they could not afford 8 children even if they wanted them. I am not advocating a Chinese style limit on numbers of children but it could seem to those looking in from outside that we are encouraging this.

So far no politician has had the cahones to tackle this but when all the other stones are bled dry even those who are now asking the question where will we get the money will be forced to look at this scenario. The USA cut welfare in the good times but good old Ireland we increased it supported by all parties in the Dail indeed with most opposition parties crying that the increases were too small.

Proposed cuts to frontline will if enacted result in mortgages being defaulted and bringing the net pay of frontline workers ever closer to the welfare rates with the elite remaining untouched. Its hard to know whether to describe it as a strange form of socialism or capitalism

Great post Billy

Excellent post.

Good for you. We have to stop this constant bickering between the two sectors and recognise how it is fuelled by our media

@ Billy

…”An unemployed father of eight was recently in a Mayo court and said he was on 700 p/week” I dont care if he swore on a stack of bibles – that is a big fat lie. Ring your nearest welfare office and ask them yourself how much a married couple with 8 children get!! It most certianly isnt 700 euros per week or nothing like it. If you cant be arsed phoning them up and getting the correct payment figure, give me a shout and I’ll do it for you!!

If the directors of a bankrupt private company can get the government, which means the taxpayers, to bail them out, then more power to them. If the people are idiots who earned nothing when Anglo shares soared and they paid very high interest rates to wealthy depositors and then when the sh1t hit the fan the taxpayers gave them back their losses, bigger fools the taxpayers. Once the government steps in and interferes then it ceases to be a free market.

No William that might be an interpretation of what a free market is based on a literal meaning of the words but it is not what a free market is in economic terms. Even the most free markets in existence need government intervention to redistribute wealth and to provide the services that the free market will never provide on its own (hence the public sector). The free market is far from perfect and prices and availability of goods and services fluctuates based on supply and demand. Also competition needs to be protected so that’s another necessary interference in the free market. As I said the safeguards that were supposed to be in place in this country failed spectacularly and the government acted at the time. It’s not really good enough to simplify it down as you have and blame the “stupid” taxpayers for stepping in to prevent the financial meltdown. You talk as if the free market is the answer to all the problems of an economy when in fact it is a large part of the problem when the free market runs wild. I am far from a. Communist/socialist but I do see that government needs to take responsibility for regulation and to keep some control over the market

Sorry Jason, but there is no dispute here. Either private businesses are allowed to fail for whatever reason or we have socialism/communism. There is no debate. Failing is one of the most important aspects of the free market. I don’t even believe in other than the absolute minimum regulation, e.g. fraud is not allowed. The regulation failures allowed or even forced the governments to interfere. The more interference the less a free market you have. I’m not in the slightest interested in any argument made on economic theory grounds. Economics is like philosophy, most of psychology and theology, bullsh1t.

No William it’s just not that simple. If a private business that is allowed to run rampage using free market principles, then folds and as collateral damage destroys a country that had nothing to do with its rampage there is something fundamentally wrong. Just because you don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it’s not true. You dismiss economic theory, most of psychology and philosophy as being unfounded or words to that effect. You are certainly wrong in regards to psychology. Good psychology does not make extraordinary claims but is meticulously researched and tested to scientific principles so has credibility with informed people that care to check the actual research instead of the sensationalist media spin out on articles. Similarly economic theory is researched and though in a lot of cases unprovable in the real world is well founded. Take for example counter cyclical economic theory. It makes sense in theory but will never be done in real world fur to problems actually accessing the money needed in bad times and the prospect of cutting back and taxing people in good times meaning political suicide for incumbent governments. It’s easy to dismiss that which you may not understand. With regard to philosophy I can’t comment as I know nothing about it

Jason, letting Anglo go bust would not destroy the country. Rescuing it, nearly did. If it was allowed go bust all the stupid people who invested in it would lose their money – tough! That’s Capitalism. You back a winner you make money, you back a loser you lose money. If “Economic Theory” was any use whatsoever, how come there weren’t crowds of Economists demonstrating outside the Dail when the country went mad borrowing money it couldn’t pay back? I’m not an Economist but when I heard what was paid for a few acres in Ballsbridge I knew the country was gone mad. Philosophers know nothing about Philosophy either so don’t worry that you don’t. It’s a bit like knowing about Homoeopathy, there’s nothing to know.

William we’re not too far apart in thinking really but if the “bond holders” weren’t paid we would have had trouble getting loans to run the country subsequently. I agree it was a complete disaster letting it get to that stage… I’m not an economist either but I have studied it a bit as well as psychology in third level so I have a small bit of background. I completely agree with your views on homeopathy 100%. Any “science” that claims that the more diluted an ingredient the more powerful it is has to be wrong:) fair enough and call it the placebo effect cos if it works then that’s what it is… Don’t even get me started on nutritionists either:) you’re one, I’m one everyone is a nutritionist cos it ain’t a science:)

Obviously not, they’re still there ain’t they?

While they have the public bickering among themselves. Divided and conquered!

We’ve learned nothing but how to be better serfs. Swapping one load of gobsh**es for another and continuing to take whatever abuse they pile on us.
And this is only highlighted by the recent reports of Fianna Fáil’s rising popularity?
I don’t even care to fight anymore I.e vote.
FF are despicable & Enda Kenny terrifies me.

@ Billy Horan
(We all know that tackling this as well as welfare fraud is something that could cost the govt votes and yes it will cost votes but as a society we need to ask what kind of a society do we want a welfare society that favours those who choose not to work and see having children as a means to increasing their overall income or a society that encourages people to work. During the boom a large number of the long term unemployed did not return to the workforce and real jobs were filled by migrants from outside mainly European countries as our people chose to continue receiving welfare. It was a lifestyle choice plain and simple. It is this cohort that daily fill up surgeries of doctors across the country and A+E waiting rooms with out a thought for the knock on effect. It is this cohort to a large extent that end up in our court systems and jails costing us even more on free legal aid and eventually keeping them in prison. The do gooders in society will tell us these people are the marginalized of society and didnt get enough rice crispies when they were young and we should feel sorry for them. It is also this cohort that are the most demanding with the public services with their attitude of “I am entitled to x, y and z” with ordinary decent people almost apologising for attending A&E, Garda Stations etc.)

Above post concerning the unemployed, is factually incorrect, and does nothing but divide us even more more. Please support your statements with facts. Ireland had the lowest unemployment rates in Europe during the boom. Statements about migrant workers is outrageous and inflammatory to say the least.

Second, child benefit should not be paid to families or any single person earning over a hundred thousand a year.
Why ???? originally child benefit was introduced to poor Irish traditional families in the 1950s . FF introduced it as universal payment to simply win votes. Nothing altruistic about their motives what so ever and that has never changed.

Ireland has one of the lowest welfare rates in Europe when you look at the cost of living. Example in the netherlands , you get two third of your wages once you are unemployed, in order to help you find work. What do you get here 180 euro.
Now the big one the wealthy globally are estimated to be hiding over 20 trilllion dollars from the tax man. Multi national companies are operating in this country and deliberately up to their neck in tax avoidance through some offshore tax dodge . Apple, Google to name two. Social welfare fraud is nothing compared to multi nationals tax dodging scams . Will they get proison sentences ????

@Seamus
10 years take for property tax at the current rate will just about cover Seani Fitz’s pension pot €28,000,000.
kinda says it all eh?

@ Billy Horan

I will say this for the 100th time on this site – THERE WERE 30,000 LONGTERM UNEMPLOYED PEOPLE DURING THE BOOM TIMES. Do some research and stop adding to the myth of the luxurious lifestyle of the to be had on welfare by the unemployed.

Further to that – those 30 000 people probably dont vote, so no political party will be any worse/better off at election time. However I reckon that there are probably at least 30 000 people who would be worse off should the government decide to sort out the loopholes in the tax laws, which enable the wealthy amongst us to avoid paying their fair share of tax.

That’s capitalism for ya!

It was put quite simply last night at that meeting.

“If they don’t want to pay me extra for working Saturdays and Sunday’s and night duty, quite simply I won’t work them. I’d much rather be at home with my children and wife”

They are paying you extra ; 50% extra.

That’s the terms the TD’s and Bankers signed up to as well. Going by your logic they should be entitled to their bonuses and extra payments too?

In fairness you cant put greedy bankers/tds in the same pot as nurses guards firemen etc who pretty much are saving lifes etc and not shifting money around and scratching backs

I think Colin is making that point that you can’t decide that one group of people’s terms and conditions should be immune from change while another group’s can be altered simply because you like one group and don’t like the other.

Willie
It’s double time.

I assure you the wage I get on a Sunday is time and a half…

Ahh Paddy Richard Rodgers the man with the finger on the pulse of Ireland.
Your comments always give a great indication of where the people of this country stand.
whatever you say the complete opposite always rings through.
Your comment a while ago the 1000 nursing positions would be filled in a day was the best yet
Keep up the good work!

Not in the guards know it all

Sorry but the majority of full time positions where people are contracted to shift work also have a shift premium.
Government spin has cheekily lumped in everything from questionable allowances with shift premium by calling everything an “allowance”.

This has been a successful tactic so far.

People who work in any job should be referring to separate payments appropriately. Shift allowance is really an unsociable hours payment and should be referred to as such. The same with other things which have been lumped into the “allowance” category in an effort to stir up division and derision from the private sector. (who also have unions, unsociable hours payments, etc who will be attacked in time if the government are allowed to walk all over the PS)

I can only hope that teachers have the guts when the time comes also. It would be a smart move for teachers (and others) to be out in support of the 24/7 alliance now.

There is already a 24 7 roster! There are 10 hours shifts for Gardai, 12 hours routinely for nurses with changeover which can take another hour, 15 hour nights for the DFB and up to 24 hours for Junior Doctors, apologies if its more! Your suggestions for 12 hour days won’t work. You will find by the time this is all over then 10 hour days will likely be the norm. Otherwise the state risks legal action from EU.

I deliberately left out Junior Doctors, as they seem to have their own fight and arrangements.

I understand that there’s already 12 hour shifts from time to time, and that sometimes people work more. In fact, it’s the thrust of my argument – that people have to show willy-nilly flexibility instead of having structured rosters that e.g. begin and end at 8pm. It would probably require a period of being on-call for each person, to cover a particularly busy time, but again this would be rostered and included in core pay.

Either way, I don’t work on the front line, so what would I know. But I do know a thing about constraint based solutions, and the current system is all over the place based on the evidence as portrayed in the media, and in the comments of both sides of the argument. Hospital managers calling for simplified rostering, front line workers calling for improved conditions and less overtime.

It seems to me that it would be better for frontline workers to have a shift covering 3 consecutive calendar days, with any overtime amounting to a full shift, and never ‘stay on for 3 more hours’ – a person on call having to come in to augment staff cover for the next full 12 hour shift instead.

Just some ideas. Not everyone might like it, but you can be sure the scheduling would be improved, overtime could be cut down on generally, and staff working e.g. a Monday – Wednesday shift with on call Thursday (potential for overtime) might actually get the weekend they were supposed to have.

Would go a long with most of this Rónán. A truely mad system of pay and allowances have developed in this country that is not just expensive to the country but expensive to administer. Any job that requires people to routinely to work nights/weekends should not be paid any premium rates like double time for Sundays. The rate of pay should reflect the fact that certain jobs require people to work unsocialable hours. So for example if you work shifts you get the basic rate plus X. X could be something like a 20% top up. If you don’t work shifts then you don’t get X.

Lab staff work oncall and many do 24 hours shifts. in my place of work, most were down €10k and many came off the rota as it wasnt worth their while financially to do it anymore and why should they? 24 shifts on the frontline is exhausting and if a mistake is made due to tiredness, someone dies.

Ronan – as would be standard in any work I would suggest that putting shift premiums into hourly rate is problematic and not at all simple.

To do what pretty much any industry does: hourly rate + x% shift premium is not in any way complex. The % rate should be determined by the nature of the unsociable hours. I’ve worked in private industry on 3 different shift types attracting between 20-33.3% depending on the rota type. Anything beyond 39 hour week was paid at 1.5x for first 4 hours and 2x for subsequent. Weekend and nightshifts should be incorporated into shift premium.

Actually Ronan, alot of that is already in place in some areas of 24/7 groups.

But I have to applaud you for having a sensible and constructive contribution.

I wasn’t having a go at you Ronan. I applaud many of your points. In the prison service they have much of what you suggest factored into the core pay. The Gardai are nearly a year into a new roster system that configures 10 hour days across the board and hugely eliminates overtime. The HSE roster appears very complex and I think the DFB still do 15 hour nights. Your 3 x 12 hour days won’t work for Gardai as they do an average of 40 hours per week. It would cause huge reconfiguration of the new roster and the overlaps that are now in place regarding rostering would disappear.

Who would work the weekends then Reg? Most frontline staff rely on Sunday pay to make up the losses incurred past few years. If they don’t get paid appropriately then I can see huge issues. I am not saying the current system is perfect either.

No sure what you’re getting at Shane. The people who work in these professions should expect to have to work on Sundays as part of their roster and be appropriately compensated generally. People should not be relying on Sunday double time pay to have a reasonable income.

Y’see Reg, with these allowances in place, core pay has been slowly but surely cut over time. A Sunday allowance can now make up a quarter of a young frontline workers payslip.

I’m not sure that’s the whole story Mark. Over the years, unions looked for pay increases and what happened in many cases is that previous governments conceded to a range of allowances so as not to be seen to be increasing core pay for particular professions. Bertie and Fianna Fail were masters at it. It has now lead to an almighty mess and some professions getting a range of allowances that seem absolutely ridiculous to most people. The system is in need or reform.

No, it’s not the whole story, just bite size pieces. In reference to what I said for example, with unions trying to protect pay rates, the governments answer has always been to cut the salary for new entrants and achieve savings this way. And as this entrants allowances and increments are now also reduced, come the time that they are no longer new entrants, their salary and/or core pay are lower than what the average had been five years previously to someone with the same length of service.

Just look at the ‘yellow pack’ nurse scheme. Starting out on 80% of what the starting rate was, they would need the sunday allowance to suppliment their weak core pay.

They do expect to work them. But they also expect to be paid for them. I am not saying the system is perfect in this respect. They knew when they took the job all the terms and conditions. They also expected decent remuneration when they signed up. And I can confirm many frontline staff do depend on Sunday time and night pay to keep their head above water.

@Fon it won’t affect the non frontline workers at all as they don’t work nights, weekends or public holidays at all.

Below is a list of pay scales for the new entrants since 2011.

http://www.impact.ie/Your-Sector/Public-Sector/Civil-Service/Civil-service-salary-scales/New-scales-for-new-entrants-2011-Civil-Service.htm

Anyone in the PS on a salary of €40k is coming out with €2k net per month. That includes medical staff. Hardly massive wages. And a pension of €12500 a year after 40 years is not a ‘gold plated pension’ either.

40k???, more like 26k mate.

You obviously weren’t paying much attention to the rally last night. It was the 24/7 alliance i.e guards, nurses, firemen prison officers. Doubt you can find one of them that works a “standard” 35 hour week. Try working an 84 hour week of nights as some nurses do or a 60 hour week of nights as guards do etc etc. you might then understand that the little bit extra they get for working these hours is very hard earned.

Lmao are u comparing the job of a guard/nurse to the same as someone sitting on a till in dunnes?

Nurses, Gardai, Firefighters and prison officers don’t live in the real world now? Maybe you should speak to one. They might shock you. Always someone wanting to change these discussions into private v public. So tell me this. Is the banking sector the real world? Developers, was that the real world? Nobody blinked an eye at public sector pay in the good oul days. Public servant pay has already been cut by 15.5%. You think it’s greed that is driving these people to protect their pay and conditions? It’s about more than that also. Proposed cuts to the fire service in the keep the community safe document will lead to loss of life. It has in England and it will here.

The person on the till in dunnes is just as important as the guard or nurse. They have their family and bills and mortgage to think of too. Don’t consider them to be less important than anyone else. The guard and nurse won’t be able to get their shopping without them!

Apparently nobody is as important as the Public Service worker Mark

Mark… Who said they weren’t as important? But let’s use our little brains here you can’t compare the work of a guard, nurse, paramedic etc to that of a supermarket till worker? A till worker isn’t responsible for people’s lives and they don’t have to put their lives in danger everytime they go to work! Hense the reason their job requires very little training and qualifications. And by the way i say this this as a worker in the private sector on minimum wage!

I’m a “frontline worker” William. I certainly don’t think myself any better than a non frontline worker. I do however consider at the very least that my hours are much harder than non frontline workers. I also have a much higher chance of physical injury at the very least than a non frontline worker. There is no “danger pay” for frontline workers. I know I am arguing the case for unsocial hours that non frontline workers don’t do so that’s the difference in my book. Pay for the difference in the job.

We all need the public sector. We dont all need GSK who earn MASSIVE wages by the way.

My wife is one of those GSK workers so how is reducing my pay going to help us?

You don’t need pharmaceutical companies, tommy?? Who are you, superman?? See how much use a hospital is without the people who supply medicine… I’m not saying its not difficult for frontline workers, just think some perspective is needed. Job security is huge at this time and its something I’d love to have. Do you think I get paid double time when working from home on a Sunday?? My wage has dropped 35% since 2007 and no I’m not in an area that caused the downturn. We’re in huge debt here and all the posters and catchy chants about noonan and merkel aren’t gonna help… Can’t understand why more people in the public service aren’t demanding that the union bosses reduce their wages or at least demand that they reveal them…

@ Martin

The pay of Trade Union officials is a matter of public record. They release that information every year.

@Maths Debate I’m afraid that’s not true. Some have revealed them but they’re not a matter of public record. Anyway, why are people not demanding they be reduced? They should be the average wage of their members. If workers have “No more to give” why are they happy to pay Jack o’Connor et al a 6 figure sum??

Not everyone needs pharmaceuticals is right. As for working from home when working for a big company, well thats a joke. Friends of mine work for IBM and spend days ‘working from home’. What a joke! Its incomparible with the jobs nurses and gardai do.

@Tommy Sorry, you don’t need pharmaceutical companies? So, you don’t need medicine? I’ll ask again, are you superman? Sounds like you need electro shock therapy to be honest… Working from home on the weekends on top of the working week. As in its unpaid, Tommy. You also didn’t address the issue of job security, but never mind…

SIPTU releases its accounts publicly, if you’d looked at them you’d see that their officials have taken a paycut in recent years, including Jack O’Connor. O’Connor earns a 6 figure salary (€115,000) for representing an organisation of over 200,000 workers. It would be difficult to someone who effectively heads an organisation of that size and earns less. He was elected to his position by his members, and they are entitled of course to ask for reductions in his salary, the union is a very democratic organisation.

In the case of members however, their subscriptions are based on what they earn and those who are struggling pay very little or nothing in some cases.

Job security? So everyone in the PS has job security? Nonsense. We just let 3 contracted staff members go. The pals of mine in IBM and GSK earn more than I ever did. Thats pretty much how it works. Average pay for a permanent job, which I technically CAN lose or plenty of pay for a not so secure job w a company that pays little or no corporation tax or VAT in Ireland at all. And if I need drugs from GSK, I use my wages to pay for them. Drugs companies have fleeced this country and others for years for overpriced drugs that cost little to manufacture but that are sold for millions.

Martin I’m constantly working from home for free as a Garda, I’m on MY laptop that I payed for doing reports and statements because my management can’t give me time to do it in work because there’s not enough to cover me. I don’t get any allowance or pay for this I buy my own laptop USB keys etc.. This is one of the good will items that will be stopping in the very near future, along with mobile phones etc for which I pay a massive bill monthly because I’m never off it on work calls. What I’m saying is many in the frontline services work for free at home and at their workplace.

If government employees need premium payment for working 6-8pm , Saturday and night shifts surely all tax payers are deserving of this.
Any nurse or guard realised it wasn’t a 9-5 job they signed up for , Kenny wad.quoting crazy figures of 500-600 for q sunday shift for a nurse, no wonder we re broke

Yeah Tommy €38k pa that’s MASSIVE

@martin…. It maybe a surprise to hear but actually many guards have to bring their paperwork home as some stations only have 3/4 computers you can access to do files! And it’s generally a race to get to a computer before a colleague… And just as your starting a file you can near always guarantee getting a call to rush out of the station and go to a robbery/crash/fight etc…

At least when your sitting working from home, your family have the peace of mind that your ok… Unlike guards/firemen/nurses… They are the only jobs that you can’t predict what will happen to you during your shift… If your a nurse you can have violent patients.. If your a fireman that jobs carries its own hazards… If your a guard your also facing into the unknown!

You do realise the unsocial hours payments are not a unique phenomenon to the public sector? That figure quoted by Kenny is completely wrong. But of course Kenny would never tell lies. He has a five point plan.

You will find if they work it they get paid for it, public or private!

GSK didn’t lay people off because Nurses get double time for being treated like shit on a Sunday. GSK laid people off to maximise profits.

That “unknown” is what you sign up for as a fireman or Garda, you cannot say you should get paid any extra for having to drop everything to attend a fire, robbery etc. it is the whole point of the job.

Colin a bit late to the conversation I’d say. You obviously haven’t been keeping up… Who’s talking about answering calls to fires or robberies? It’s about out of hours payments..

Yes of course and when all these workers ‘signed up’ working unsociable hours carried extra pay for it. It’s the exact same as signing up to work Monday to Friday and being told you don’t get paid for Friday anymore. Oh but you knew you had to work Friday when you signed up.

Fairly silly comment considering its a basic economic principle of supply and demand. If you demand a service that is outside of regular working hours it must be supplied. The problem with your argument is that the supply won’t be there unless it is paid for. This basically means that unless everyone in the country works on a shift basis then there must be a premium paid to encourage people to work during the hours that people don’t want to work. Working nights is extremely bad for ones health, working Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays is extremely bad for ones family. You do realise that kids sports training and games are mostly at weekends. Public holidays are mostly on Mondays after weekends which means whole family weekends are a no no if you’re rostered to work it. I knew I’d be doing these hours and I also knew I’d be paid fairly for them so I decided on my career. Lucky for society in general others did too. I don’t think anyone can genuinely argue that unsocial hours should not be compensated for in either public or private sector. Solution though is to make everyone in the country work shifts then problem solved… Ain’t going to happen though

I work unsocial hours as a chef I work every weekend and bank holiday Mondays I don’t get extra pay but I knew this when I went in to this job. I hated working 9-5. Putting up with Rush hour traffic madness at weekends in shopping centres
It maybe “unsocial” hours but its so much easier.

Chefs do not do full nights though David do they? And the vast majority of people do not like working weekends or public holidays. Just because you do doesn’t mean everyone else has to. In fact that’s why the premiums are there. I know quite a few chefs that get paid extra for doing the evening service

@David Cullen, yes it was made quite clear to us in our contracts that we would be required to work on Sundays, bank holidays, early mornings, evenings, nights, and even the occasional christmas day. We knew what we were signing up for.

Oh, by the way, it was also made quite clear to us in our contracts that we would be reimbursed for working these hours.

Appreciate your point you also work unsocial hours David but were you made aware of how much your wages would be when you started working as a chef? You went ahead based on that knowledge. Put yourself in their shoes. Your employer now tells you you have to take another 10-15% cut on top of the 15.5% you already took in the last 2 years. You have a mortgage and family you can barely support as it is. Are you going to be happy about that?

Well said David. About time someone spoke sense on here regarding pay on weekends. If your job requires you to work weekends then so be it. Its your job deal with it or get out. Double or time and a half should be scrapped altogether.

Yes ‘Begrudgery’, our jobs require us to work weekends. And in turn our job is required to pay us for working weekends.

If we are no longer paid to work these unsocial hours, then perhaps we should withdraw our services from these unsocial hours.