New public pay talks are likely in the new year

The Government will discuss the escalating crisis over public sector pay at its meeting this morning with senior figures conceding that talks on a new pay settlement are likely in January or February of next year.

While Ministers are likely to publicly ignore a deadline of Thursday to agree to new pay talks set by Siptu chief Jack O’Connor last week, privately senior officials and Ministers say that a process to revise the Lansdowne Road Agreement could start early in the new year.

Ministers continue to insist that no extra money is available for public sector pay next year beyond the extra €660 million provided for in the recent budget.

Public servants are due to receive pay increases next year under the Lansdowne agreement but as pressures grow throughout the public sector, Government sources believe that some acceleration of the process may be inevitable.

Yesterday, junior doctors became the latest group of public servants to threaten to strike over pay.

Nurses, secondary teachers and gardaí are already demanding early pay increases, while Siptu said last week that it would ballot its 60,000 public sector members for industrial action if the Government did not agree by Thursday to open pay talks by February.

The Minister for Public Expenditure, Paschal Donohoe, will present a memo to the Cabinet at its meeting this morning and brief his colleagues on the new and existing pay demands from the public sector trade unions.

Demographic trends

Mr Donohoe will say that existing demographic trends would require the recruitment of an additional 8,000-9,000 public servants every year between now and 2020.

According to projections produced by the Department of Public Expenditure, the cost of demographic changes – principally growing numbers of young and old people – will put additional cost pressures on the State of between €428 and €440 each year until 2020.

Senior political figures are suggesting that while Cabinet will discuss public service pay on Tuesday there will be no decisions taken.

However, they accept that a process – variously described as “adjusting”, “updating” or “recasting” the Lansdowne agreement – will be necessary if widespread strikes in the public sector are to be avoided.

Most public service staff are due to receive a €1,000 increase in September 2017 under the Lansdowne accord.

It is understood that Ministers have been told it would cost about €25-€30 million for every month if this payment is brought forward.

If additional money is involved in any deal, then the full costs will be higher.

Commission

The Public Service Pay Commission, which was recently set up by the Government to examine pay levels in the public sector compared to both the private sector and the public services of other countries, and also to consider the value of public sector pensions, may now be asked to produce an early report in advance of pay talks next spring.

This would leave only a matter of weeks for the body to conduct complex comparisons and detailed calculations.

Highly placed sources said the decision yesterday to pull out Government negotiators from talks with doctors on the restoration of a €3,000 allowance was taken by the department which feared it would undermine overall contacts under way with the trade union movement on public service pay in the light of the recent Labour Court recommendation for gardaí.

The Irish Medical Organisation had expected that a new offer would be put on the table at the talks yesterday.

However, Government negotiators said they no longer had sanction to continue the discussions and that the issue of the living out allowance for non-consultant doctors would form part of the overall work of the pay commission.