Government puts pay rises for senior gardaí on hold

Senor gardaí will not receive pay rises which came into effect from this month as they have not signed up to the new public service agreement, the Department of Justice has said.

The new pay deal, which was negotiated last year, provides for increases ranging from 6.2 per cent to 7.4 per cent over the three -year period from this year to 2020. The first 1 per cent pay rise came into effect in January with a further 1 per cent increase scheduled to follow in October.

The Department of Justice said the Association of Garda Superintendents (AGS) and the Association of Garda Chief Superintendents (AGCS) had taken part in the talks that led to the new public service deal but indicated that they could not put the proposals to ballot until an outstanding issue was resolved.

The department said under new legislation pay increases would not come into effect until the agreement was accepted.

Sinn Féin found McElduff’s ‘stupid’ actions impossible to defend

---

Government set to accept abortion committee’s recommendations

---

Urgent need to tackle underfunding of higher education, universities warn

---

Murphy does not know how many homes were built last year

---

Last week Garda superintendents said they will not engage with changes within the force after they claimed the Government reneged on a pay deal.

‘Serious anomaly’

Denis Ferry, general secretary of AGS, said there was a "serious anomaly" in pay as a result of an agreement reached in November 2016 with gardaí which averted a threatened strike.

He said newly promoted superintendents were paid between €4,000 and €6,000 less than when they were in their previous positions as inspectors.

The department said there had been ongoing discussions between the associations, the Ministers for Justice and Public Expenditure and Reform and officials of their respective departments in order to clarify matters and find a solution for this situation.

"The AGS and the AGCS were part of the negotiations for the public service stability agreement 2018-2020 and at its conclusion sought to engage further on an outstanding issue relating to the 2016 dispute and the ad hoc Labour Court recommendation," the Department of Justice said in a statement.

"In order to benefit from the pay rises under the public service stability agreement the date for acceptance of the agreement for all public servants was January 1st, 2018. The AGS and the AGCS indicated that they could not put the agreement to a ballot of their members until a satisfactory resolution of the outstanding issue had been reached and notified the Workplace Relations Commission to this effect."

It added: “The terms of the Public Service Pay and Pensions Act 2017 provide for the restoration of pay and other pay measures in respect of both ‘covered’ and ‘non-covered’ public servants and the relevant sections of the legislation apply to the superintendents and chief superintendents.”

Under the legisaltion public service personnel who are considered to be “not covered” by the agreement face a nine-month delay in the payment of increases due under the accord.

At the same time, increments would be frozen until 2020 while the existing pension levy deductions, which were reformed under the agreement, would also remain in place as at present until 2020.