Marc Coleman: Sensitivity needed when wielding axe
Choosing between jobs or pay cuts in the public sector is a no-brainer but will the Government heed sound advice, asks Marc Coleman
So then, what do you think we should do? Sack the special needs assistant earning €40k? Or reduce the pay of a university professor from €148k a year to €108k a year?
It's a fairly simple question, the answer boils down to a clear moral choice, one that I remember being illustrated in my old Catholic catechism with the following question: if 10 people are stuck on an island and there are only enough full rations for nine what should be done? The options are (a) kill one person or (b) reduce the rations by 10 per cent.
I think the vast majority of people -- Catholic or non-Catholic -- would go for option (b). But the Croke Park Agreement -- so beloved of the secular Labour Party -- effectively forces us to go for option (a): kill the special needs assistant so we can keep paying prof more than his Catholic majesty the King of Spain (who, by the way, earns €145k a year for heading a nation of 45m people).
With few exceptions -- Fine Gael TD Simon Harris is one -- most politicians have lost their moral compass on the Croke Park deal which forbids any such cuts.
Not so Central Bank Governor Patrick Honohan. Last week, he said pay cuts should be considered as an alternative to job cuts. The facts back him up: at 18 per cent of the workforce, Ireland has fewer public servants compared to the EU. Unless pay levels are also lower than EU norms, job cuts make no sense. With average earnings 44 per cent above private sector levels and between 20 and 40 per cent above EU norms (even adjusting for cost of living) the answer is clear.
Nor are pay levels justified by higher qualifications and those with such qualifications would be rudely surprised to find how little they count for in the real world of productivity and performance. Then again, many in the state sector don't earn much and have suffered pay cuts and tax hikes -- which is why any change to Croke Park must be sensitive.
Here -- oddly -- I find myself to the left of Fergus Finlay. Before the budget, he suggested abolishing increments across the board, saving €250m a year. It would have been enough to prevent cuts in fuel and children's allowance.
But for low-paid public workers, increments are a compensation for the fact that they will never be promoted (and that the work they do is stunningly boring). Across- the-board cuts are crude and counterproductive. What we need is a technology of pay reform: a sensible, sensitive mechanism to create a new covenant of fairness in public pay both vis-a-vis internal public comparisons, public/private comparisons and comparisons between pay levels here in Ireland and levels in those EU countries whose taxpayers now fund our public sector.
Benchmarking has a bad reputation but if properly implemented it is an essential tool. By matching remuneration in key job areas to EU norms and adjusting for living costs we can come up with a fair and defensible system. And get away from a divisive 'pro/anti' Croke Park debate. And from a policy that incentivises the brightest and best to leave our public sector which -- for every €3 'saved' -- loses €2 in pension payments.
Like his predecessor TK Whitaker, Central Bank Governor Patrick Honohan is giving the Government golden advice. But will it be heeded?
Brendan Howlin's response last Wednesday was to say that change in the public sector could not be "bulldozed". Funny, isn't it, how household charges, private pension levies and VAT hikes can be "bulldozed" on taxpayers but when it comes to cost-cutting in the public sector, "bulldozing" becomes impossible?
Funny also how Eamon Gilmore solemnly told us that we need to "honour agreements" with public sector unions. Just after tearing up agreements made with voters about the promissory notes/third-level fees/children's allowance (I could go on). But then where Catholic morality calls for treating all citizens the same, Labour's ethic seems to be a secular North Korean one where proles exist merely to serve the party elites and army.
Little wonder that Labour's next conference will discuss a motion calling for Catholics to be "screened" for civil service positions (to test whether they are "Catholics first and Irish second"). Those who might give the wrong answer to the question at the start of this article, must be strained out, it seems. Leo Varadkar described the idea last week as "silly". But it is more than that. Like Alan Shatter, I support Israel's right to exist and defend itself. Now Alan is our Defence Minister. And a Jew. As minister he has influence over our troops in the Lebanon (some of whom were involved in conflict with Israeli defence forces. As a Jew, he has a right to have his prior loyalty to this state to be taken at face value without anyone calling for him to be "screened".
The very idea of "screening" people for their religion is so clearly an outrage that I cannot fathom how a party like Labour could dare suggest it for Catholics. But if passed, I would suggest another "screening" idea: Labour ministers with union links should be "screened" to see if their loyalty is to the citizens of this State or to the secular hierarchy of minority insiders who vote Labour.
The Catholic Church at least gave us the option of contributing to it. As the suffering inflicted on the poor and young in the last budget to fund the greed of these secularists shows, Labour's religion is forced on us. Separate state from the church is it? I suggest what most of us now want is a final separation of state and unions.
You can follow @marcpcoleman on twitter and listen to Marc on "Coleman at Large" each Tuesday and Wednesday from 10pm on Newstalk 106-108fm
Originally published in
