Extra annual leave on the cards for thousands in Civil Service

Thousands of mid-ranking Civil Service staff seem set for an increase in their annual leave on foot of a finding by a new arbitration body.

The Civil Service Arbitration Board found that a claim by executive officers for an additional one day of annual leave after 12 years of service in the grade and a further day of annual leave after 14 years in the position had “validity”.

The Government argued against the move and maintained that introducing additional annual leave for executive officers could lead to knock-on claims across the public service.

Government representatives also maintained that the increase in annual leave sought by executive officers would lead to “a significant drop in productivity across the Civil Service equivalent to 9,000 days per annum/36.7 years”.

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The board said the issue of increased annual leave should now be discussed as part of the public service pay talks which are due to take place in the summer. The previous Fine Gael-Labour coalition had in 2012 sought to introduce greater standardisation of annual leave across the public service.

Out of line

The Public Service Executive Union (PSEU), which represents executive officers, told the board that annual leave for the staff concerned was “considerably out of line with that of direct equivalents in local authorities and the health sector”.

Leave for the staff concerned currently ranges from 23 days initially to 24 days after five years and 25 days after 10 years.

“In the case of local authorities, annualised leave levels were standardised at 30 days, a full five days more than the leave provisions for executive officers covered by this claim”, the PSEU argued.

The union said the grades equivalent to executive officers in the health service (grade V and grade VI) had not less than28 days annual leave and that those in place since before 2012 in most instances had up to 32 days. It said that in most cases those appointed since 2012 had 30 days of annual leave.

The PSEU maintained that the cost of granting the increased leave to executive officers who were 12 years or more in the grade would be “negligible”.

Cost

“The PSEU contended that it is not possible to identify a cost to any claim for annual leave involving the grades concerned, that where an executive officer was on annual leave his/her work would remain untouched and would have to catch up on his/her return at no additional cost,” the arbitration board said in its finding.

The board concluded that the claim for an additional day of leave after 12 years of service and a further day after 14 years had “a validity given the passage of time and the growing numbers of staff with commensurate levels of service”.

The executive officer grade is the entry level to junior management in the Civil Service. There are currently about 6,300 executive officers in the Civil Service, or nearly 20 per cent of the work force.