Allowances to public services may be cut back

THE GOVERNMENT has for the first time indicated that some public service staff could lose allowances on foot of a review.

The Department of Public Expenditure and Reform is evaluating about 800 allowances paid to staff across the public service. Up to now, the department has signalled that only new beneficiaries would be affected by any decision to scrap particular allowances.

However, speaking to journalists at the annual conference of the Public Service Executive Union in Kilkenny yesterday, Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Brendan Howlin said: “We are engaging on the basis of looking at the allowances into the future, that is true, but there may be cases where they are not justifiable even for existing cases.” He said all of this would be a matter for a decision by the Government, and he would be making proposals when the evaluation was finalised.

Last week teaching unions warned that they would consider any cuts in allowances paid to their members as a breach of the Croke Park agreement.

Mr Howlin said the €500 million spent on sick pay in the public service was not sustainable.

He said the Government had set out to have a standardised sick leave arrangement in the public service and had engaged with the unions. Progress was being made and he would bring proposals to Cabinet.

“What I have said is that the full quantum in relation to sick pay is not sustainable into the future. I think most public servants understand that. There are various different practices in different areas of the public service, so we have had different engagement with different unions.”

In his address to the conference the Minister said more radical and innovative ways of extracting costs and increasing productivity were required under the Croke Park agreement. Further reform was necessary for the public service to function effectively.

The Minister told delegates that the Croke Park agreement was under scrutiny not just from the media and the public but that the EU-European Central Bank-International Monetary Fund troika was “viewing and questioning” the deal on every visit to Ireland.

He said that over the period 2009 to 2015, it was expected that the exchequer pay bill would reduce from €17.5 billion to €13.7 billion as a result of measures agreed under the Croke Park deal. “That amounts to a saving of €3.8 billion from the peak of the public pay bill. Even when the inevitable increase in public service pension costs over that period are included, there will still be a €3.3 billion, or nearly 19 per cent, reduction, which, by any measure, is very significant.”

Mr Howlin said it was “in all of our interests that we make a success of this agreement and to prove the doubters wrong”.

“Within the framework of the agreement, we need to look at more radical and innovative ways to extract costs and deliver increased productivity and reform.

“It is important that all staff get behind the delivery of change, whether it is changing employer or location, retraining and upskilling to do different things, co-operating with the introduction of shared service operations, or changing the way in which we interact with customers and business.

“Further reform is necessary for the public service to function effectively into the future.”

Mr Howlin said the Government wanted to stand by the Croke Park agreement and the commitments it has made. However, this would only be possible if there was “full and continued co-operation with the implementation of the change and reform agendas set out in the revised action plans for each sector”.

The Minister said trade unions were entitled to press public service management to show the benefits and cost reductions which would follow from change. He said efficiencies needed to be transparent. However he warned: “Where potential efficiencies are identified, you have committed under the agreement to help us deliver those efficiencies.”

The Minister said the Government would also continue to address the challenge of creating a single public service. Progress was being made in that regard with the introduction of standardised arrangements for annual leave and the review of allowances and sick leave arrangements that were under way.