'Museum workers give public sector bad name'
Sunday April 12 2009
Museum staff in Dublin have been accused of giving the public service "a bad name" after two of the country's best-known museums closed today due to industrial trouble.
The National Museum in Kildare Street and Collins Barracks have both been closed because staff are insisting that everybody who turns up for Sunday overtime has to be paid -- even when they're not needed and are not on the Sunday roster.
Management of the museum service insist that six staff are required in Kildare Street and 18 in Collins Barracks for Sunday.
Staff, who are members of the CPSU union are not required to work on Sunday -- but are paid overtime when they do.
Recently three staff were rostered for Sunday work at Kildare Street -- but when six extra turned up they insisted that all nine had to be paid, even though three of them were not required. On other occasions, not enough staff turn up and parts of the museums have to be closed because of lack of manpower.
Not only are staff paid over-time, but their Sunday work also becomes part of their pensionable salary, so that museum staff coming towards the retirement age can "top up" their pensions by Sunday working. "It's a crazy situation" says a member of the management team. "We can't actually give the public a service -- and that's giving the public service a bad name."
But last night one of the attendants Hugh Murray said "we want to keep the museum open" and blamed management for the closure. He said that the real issue was that the Museum management wanted to take away all over-time, including night work and Sunday work and give it to a private security company.
The good news is that the Museum of Natural History in Merrion Street, Dublin, which has been closed for 18 months since a staircase collapsed, will re-open, it is hoped, in September.
- LIAM COLLINS
