ALMOST 40 per cent of civil servants approved for early retirement are currently employed with the Revenue Commissioners, Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan has revealed.
Responding to a parliamentary question last week from Labour TD Joanna Tuffy, Mr Lenihan said that by mid-November 818 civil servants had been approved for the Incentivised Scheme for Early Retirement, including 322 Revenue staff.
“These Civil Service numbers are based on returns from all departments and offices. In the wider public service, some 167 public servants have had their applications approved,” he said.
Mr Lenihan added that information from the local authorities was not expected until later in the month. Processing of applications had been suspended in the health sector “as a result of a direction by Impact and some other health unions to their members not to co-operate with redeployment”.
Out of the 818 approved applications, a total of 389 were from the finance group, including 322 from the Revenue Commissioners, which is one of the biggest employers in the Civil Service.
The second-highest number of applicants to be approved came from the Department of Justice, at 106. Figures for other departments include 75 in Social and Family Affairs, 51 in Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and 39 in Environment, Heritage and Local Government. The scheme was announced by the Minister in the supplementary budget last April.
Ms Tuffy said the category of “public servants” refers to employees of non-commercial State bodies or agencies and that this figure did not include gardaí, teachers, members of the Defence Forces or prison officers as all of these already had their own distinct early retirement schemes.
The Labour spokeswoman said: “I am very wary of this idea that we should reduce public sector numbers in this way. It is being done very much on an ad hoc basis. This is just about cutting costs. I am not aware of any Government policy to ensure that the scheme is used in a balanced way.”
She added that, based on answers to other parliamentary questions, it was clear that the numbers of people employed by the public sector on a non-permanent basis has dropped by at least 8,000 in the last two years.
“While there have been some instances of bodies making permanent appointments, net job losses among these departments and agencies total just over 6,000.
“The figures relate to those employed by 34 city and county councils, the Health Service Executive and the Civil Service. This number is certainly on the conservative side, because it doesn’t take account of job losses in the likes of town councils [or] the commercial semi-State or State agencies, like Fás.
“The result of these staff cuts is that workers are being asked to take on extra responsibility when posts become vacant and are not filled. This means that there is added pressure on those that remain and that public and local services are being stretched to breaking point and beyond,” Ms Tuffy said.
