Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 24 May 2018

Vol. 969 No. 6

Pay Inequality in the Public Service: Statements

Minister of State at the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform (Deputy Michael D'Arcy)

I welcome this opportunity to discuss the issue of new entrant pay scales for public servants. The context for the introduction of such scales by the then Government in 2011 is important. It merits reflection and repeating. In order to address the calamitous fiscal crisis at that time, nine budgetary events involving €30 billion in consolidation measures were announced between 2008 and 2014. Two thirds of the adjustment burden fell on expenditure, with the remainder on tax. Approximately half of the total adjustment took place between 2008 and 2010, with the remainder occurring in the period 2011 to 2014. A fiscal crisis of this size is without precedent in Ireland’s recorded economic history and has few modern international parallels.

Public service pay comprised 35% of total expenditure in 2008 and changes to both the numbers employed and the rates of remuneration formed an important part of Ireland’s overall fiscal consolidation. Between 2009, gross, and 2014, net, in the aftermath of the introduction of the public service pension reduction, PSPR, there was a reduction of €3.7 billion, or 21%, in the public service pay bill. Of this, €2.1 billion was delivered through financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, actions on public service pay. The balance of the savings was attributable to reductions in numbers, elimination of various public service allowances and productivity measures underpinned by public service agreements.

The then Government also introduced a series of measures as part of the national recovery plan in November 2010. These required all public servants to start on the minimum point on the scale and there was a 10% reduction in the pay of new entrants to the public service. Thankfully, through the sacrifice of our citizens, difficult decisions by successive Governments, the programme for support from our international partners and continued sustainable and prudent management of the economy by the current Administration, we have now reached a far better place. The strength of the recovery has exceeded expectations. When the labour market reached its nadir in 2012, over 340,000 jobs had been lost and the unemployment rate stood at 16%. Strong employment growth has seen nine out of every ten jobs lost during the recession recovered. The unemployment rate is now down to 5.9% and a situation of full employment is fast approaching.

While momentum in the economy remains strong, there are clouds on the horizon. The UK’s decision to exit the EU, an increase in protectionist measures and changes in other jurisdictions that affect the competitiveness of our corporate tax regime are all of particular concern to Ireland as a small, highly globalised economy. One of the keys to addressing these challenges and ensuring that we never return to the dark economic place we have left lies in making sure that our public finances continue to be managed in a prudent fashion. That is of particular importance considering that our public debt levels remain at approximately 100% when scaled by modified gross national income, GNI.

Despite this tremendous progress, we still carry major public policy overhangs as legacies from the crisis. We need look no further than our current housing situation to realise that this country and its people continue to pay a heavy price for the fiscal crisis and the economic mismanagement that contributed so significantly to the depth of that crisis. Indeed, in securing the passage of the Public Service Pay and Pensions Act 2017, which provided for the implementation of the terms of the Public Service Stability Agreement 2018-2020, the Minister for Finance and Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohoe, also provided for the unwinding of the FEMPI measures which have applied to public service pay and pensions since 2009. However, those measures will not completely unwind until July 2022. That will be 13 years after initial implementation.

This alone is testament to the depth of the fiscal crisis through which we have come and to what can happen when the public finances are not managed sustainably and prudently.

During the passage of the Public Service Pay and Pensions Act 2017 through the Oireachtas, the Government accepted an amendment to section 11 providing that, within three months of the passing of the Act, the Minister would prepare and lay before the Oireachtas a report on the cost of and a plan to deal with pay for new entrants to the public service. Also, as part of the negotiations last year which led to the Public Service Stability Agreement 2018-2020, we acknowledged issues of concern relating to the increased length of salary scale for post-2011 new entrants and we committed to an examination of the issues and to enter discussions with the parties to the agreement in regard to it. The agreement provided for an examination of remaining salary scale issues in respect of post-January 2011 recruits at entry grades would be undertaken within 12 months of the commencement of the agreement. This was a significant body of work and staff from within the Irish Government Economic Evaluation Service were assigned to collect, collate and examine the relevant data and provide detailed point-in-time costs associated with the measure.

As the Department with responsibility for reconciling the various demands made on the Exchequer, it is necessary for us, at a minimum, to quantify, evaluate and consider whether, within the resources available to us as a nation, any spending increases being advocated are sustainable and affordable and can be prioritised among the many pressing social and other needs of Irish society. That is not to say that all requests for additional expenditure are without merit. The Government appreciates that extra funding is necessary and must be committed in certain areas, for example, an increase of €1.5 billion in capital spending to provide the homes, hospitals and other infrastructure investments our society needs. What is important, however, is that additional spending proposals are carefully thought through by the Oireachtas and evaluated in advance in order that the consequences and trade-offs are known before any budgetary decisions are taken.

I emphasise that we cannot say, on the one hand, that we need to ensure the public finances are managed in a stable way and that we must not repeat the mistakes of the past, while, on the other hand, telling ourselves that we can meet every individual demand. We will not be able to meet the needs and demands of all groups. We have a public service pay agreement for three years and this is year one. We are committed to engaging with everyone in good faith. If, however, we are saying that we need to keep the public finances stable and ensure we can afford to meet the commitments we have made, we have to understand there are responsibilities which come with that. The Government is committed to discharging those responsibilities. In fact, this is exactly the approach we have taken when examining the issues of concern regarding the increased length of the salary scale for post-January 2011 entrants to the public service. This is what we agreed with unions in last year’s pay talks and this is the process that is under way.

It is worthwhile outlining the main findings of the report to the Oireachtas and I will do so now. The first finding is that there has been strong recruitment since 2011 to the estimated 237 recruitment grades across the public service, with more than 60,500 so-called new entrants, or 19% of the public service, currently working in these grades. These include 16,000 teachers, almost 5,000 special needs assistants and approximately 10,000 nurses. Actual recruitment would have been higher when allowance is made for those who were promoted from or left new entrant grades. This confirms the finding of the Public Service Pay Commission that there was no general recruitment problem and that at lower pay levels there is a substantial pay premium in favour of public servants.

The second finding is that variation in the remuneration package offered to prospective employees in line with the economic cycle is standard practice across the labour market. Within the public service, entry-level starting salaries have improved under collective agreements that have been progressively weighted towards lower-paid entry-level employment. For example, the administrative officer scale for recruitment of graduates to the Civil Service increased by 5.4%, or €1,611, in the two years between January 2016 and January 2018.

The third finding is that the estimated cost associated with a two-point incremental adjustment for the 60,500 staff identified is significant, at approximately €200 million. Importantly, this cost is not included in the overall cost of the public service stability agreement. Work is ongoing to refine these annualised costs by grade and by sector to improve the accuracy of this estimate.

The final finding is that individual benefits would be considerable. Based on the average across all sectors, a two-point adjustment would equate to an additional €3,302. This would be on top of the pay benefits under the public service stability agreement of between 7.4% and 6.2%, or up to 10% for new entrants post 2012, which were already weighted in favour of new entrants and the lower paid.

The report to the Oireachtas makes clear the Government’s commitment to working with the parties to address these issues, in accordance with the terms of the public service pay agreement, and taking account of the significant costs involved. We started examining these issues with the parties as soon as the agreement was ratified back in October of last year. Discussions have been ongoing since then, and we met with the unions on 27 April last to discuss the report's findings. Further engagement will take place on this issue in early June.

I again thank Deputies for the opportunity to discuss these issues. I looking forward to hearing their views.

Deputy Barry Cowen

I welcome this opportunity, brief as it is, to give our initial views and comments on the ongoing inequalities that exist in the public service. I do not want to revisit the reasons and the necessity for the FEMPI measures that were introduced in 2008, 2009 and 2010. Suffice to say, it was always intended that the dissipation with respect to the emergency measures would lead to the reduction and reversal of said measures, both in terms of public service pay and the universal social charge. Fine Gael has deviated from that approach. That is evident in the way it dealt with the issue of public service pay and its flip-flop regarding its commitment to removing the universal social charge. As my colleague, Deputy Michael McGrath, said some weeks ago, it was the biggest promise - worth €4 billion - ever made in the history of the State. That promise was made, loud and clear, by Fine Gael and the current Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, who would accuse others of being reckless and feckless in terms of the commitment to which they seek to adhere regarding the way in which they would disburse the funds that are available in order to address the many inequalities that exist. The political consequences of introducing such necessary measures were all too obvious for Fianna Fáil, as a political party, but we are thankful that subsequent Governments stuck to the programme, continued the heavy lifting and pursued the final third of the adjustment necessary to create a foundation for us to take advantage of an upturn, if and when it arrived.

This is not the first time we have spoken about the inequality that exists in the public service. We have spoken in particular about the inequality for new entrants since 2011. I and my party have put forward motions on the teaching profession and others to address that issue. However, the Government has been slow and lethargic in the way it has done so. It has come to the table late but, nonetheless, it is at the table with the prospect of resolution. The reason we are still there is two pronged. The first is the lethargic manner in which the Government dealt with the issue having failed to address it to date, and the second is that it is that cohort of the workforce in the public service who are most affected by the huge cost of living expenses that have been exacerbated in recent years. We can think of many young workers in that cohort who continue to pay up to 50% and more of their income on housing costs and who are crippled by the cost of both health and car insurance. Traffic congestion continues to be a problem in many part of the city and the country, and there is a deficit in public transport provision. Both those reasons - the Government's failure to address the issue initially and then not addressing the areas of health and housing sufficiently, which has created a further burden on that workforce - have created what the Minister of State alluded to when he spoke about the difficulties the Government faces in providing the relevant finances to address this pay issue. Pay becomes the focus of people's attention when they cannot meet the demands society places on them because of the failure of Government to address some of those issues.

We included a commitment on the Public Service Pay Commission and on addressing inequality for new entrants since 2011 in the confidence and supply arrangement that we entered into to facilitate the formation of a stable Government. Moreover, during the passage of the Public Service Pay and Pensions Act, which as the Minister of State alluded to represents the unravelling of the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, legislation, we insisted on an amendment directing the Government to get a report from the Irish Government Economic and Evaluation Service costing and evaluating the adjustments needed to address that issue for new entrants. Now, belatedly, the Government has begun the process of engaging with the relevant unions to deal with that very issue. We support that process. We expect the goodwill on both sides to help to find a solution. We believe that should be addressed and agreed in the near future, in plenty of time for negotiations on the budget.

As far as we can see, there are only some definite elements of the budget at this juncture. They are the €500 million towards the rainy day fund, the cost associated with the pension anomaly that was recognised last year, especially concerning home care credits, which is being dealt with and a first commitment on the issue of pay equality. The cost associated with it is €200 million. It is up to both parties to come to a sensible conclusion and agreement on that issue and we support that.

Pay inequality in the public service is quite evident across a wide range of areas. Again, having committed to the Public Service Pay Commission, we agree with its initial task of looking at difficulties in recruitment and retention in certain areas of pivotal importance, namely, the health service, consultants and the Air Corps. The Public Service Pay Commission is due to report to the Government in June, on foot of independent recommendations to address those issues. Again, Fianna Fáil earnestly asks the Government to engage with the relevant unions associated with those areas with a view to arriving at a successful conclusion and putting in place a pathway to address those issues.

As I said to the Minister for Finance last week, it is the understanding of one of the unions pertaining to that process that the public service pay agreement for the next three years, of which we are in the first year, is predicated on recommendations not only being submitted to the Government, but being acted on by it in the second year of that three-year agreement. That union, the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, is convinced that this is provided for in the Act that I mentioned earlier. The union holds that it is provided for in clarification letters it subsequently received from the Department. The Minister is not on the same page, based on my communication and correspondence with him. That needs to be clarified as otherwise, the Government is facing the unravelling of the three-year deal.

To return to the issue of inequality for new entrants, I recently have heard commentators on the public airwaves saying that because of the CAO application process and the oversubscription to various roles including teaching, nursing, the Garda and the Defence Forces, there is nothing to fear where public sector pay is concerned. That is totally disingenuous to those who work in those areas or who wish to work in them. Many of those working in those areas and in the public service harboured an ambition to do so for a long time. Many young people today harbour that same ambition and their first priority is to fulfil that ambition. The level of pay that is associated with it might only be a secondary realisation. From their perspective, the failure of the Government to address social issues arising from their pay difficulties may also be a secondary realisation.

I am mindful of the effort that is being made at the front line of those services. We rightly appreciate, thank and laud their efforts at times of crisis, for example, during recent extreme weather events. However, that is nothing but hot air and is very disingenuous unless we can recognise the difficulty that is faced in the meantime. The three areas I mentioned are examples of the difficulties and the reasons efforts to resolve this issue must be made.

The health service has many obvious difficulties across a wide range of areas. People are living longer, there is an age demographic that will place greater strain on services and we have not provided adequately for that. In recent years we have seen centres of excellence or health provision. We have seen section 39 companies taking on a role that many would expect the State to fulfil, yet there is no recognition or coming together. There are age-old problems concerning pay but one cannot expect age-old resolutions to rectify them. That is just a small observation, rather than getting into it in any deep or meaningful way. Suffice to say that we expect the Public Service Pay Commission to make recommendations that we will be watching very carefully. Fianna Fáil is very hopeful that they will reflect the sentiments that have been expressed to us as public representatives by our constituents who are involved in that sector to the effect that there must be a sea change in the Government's approach to the provision of public services, the expectations on them and the pressures on those who are delivering those services. I refer to pressures concerning where they live, how they travel to work, how they carry out their work and how they provide for their own families in a way that allows them to deliver the service we expect and hope to improve. We cannot simply expect those services and facilities to improve to the level we would be happy with without addressing many other issues that feed into that.

Deputy David Cullinane

At the outset, my party welcomes the fact that at long last, moves are being made to address this issue. Accompanying the Minister of State today I can see some of the officials whom I met several years ago to discuss this matter. One of the questions we were examining at the time was exactly how much it would cost to unravel all of this and deal with the issue of new entrants post 2011. Finally we have a cost but we do not yet have a strategy. We certainly do not have an agreement, and that needs to be put in place.

I think it is important for us to put what happened to those new entrants into a wider context to truly appreciate why they see this as a real grievance. The Minister of State's opening statement quite rightly outlined the extent of the cuts from 2008 to 2014. Before Deputy Cowen leaves the Chamber, I note that his party was also partly responsible for the cuts and in fact was the architect of many of them. There was the universal social charge, which was a new tax on public sector workers and all workers. The public service pension levy was then introduced, which was solely for public sector workers. There were pay cuts outside of those that were taken by new entrants, cuts that were generally imposed from 2008 up to 2011. Changes to overtime and increments freezes were also put in place.

The totality of the changes that were made had a huge impact on public sector workers. Between 2008 and 2014, on average a public sector worker lost approximately 14%. On top of all this, new entrants had a further cut in their pay of 10%. This was not simply on the starting grade. If it was only the starting grade it would have been an inequality at that point, but all of the increment grades and rates, right up to retirement and the top rate, were cut. Over the lifetime of working in the service they were to lose, and lose substantially.

Obviously there have been changes, and because of political pressure and because the Government had to do something because of pressure from trade unions there was a merging of the increment scales. There was a reduction in the pension levy for those who were new entrants to alleviate a lot of the damage done, but there is still an injustice and legacy issues, which will cost €209 million. My quarrel with the Government when the last pay talks were ongoing was why this issue was not dealt with. Why was this issue left on the long finger? I could not understand it when we consider that at the heart of almost all of the industrial disputes we have seen over the course of recent years in the public sector, from gardaí to teachers to nurses, the issue of equal pay for equal work was one of the core issues, but it was not dealt with. These workers were effectively left behind.

I remember having discussions such as this with previous Ministers, who sat there and told me it was not an issue and that could be dealt with because it would cost too much money. There was no idea how much it would cost. I was told it was complicated and it could not be done. Lo and behold, suddenly the figure of €209 million appeared, it could be done and a process is being put in place to do it. This is where we have come from.

We have to recognise that those public sector workers who are new entrants have borne all of the other cuts and all of the other increases in taxation as well as this separate cut in pay that applied solely to new entrants in the public sector. It was a deliberate intentional strategy by the Government at the time to target young people coming into the public sector. It is not without its consequences. Even today, we know we have challenges recruiting nurses. We have challenges recruiting front-line staff to our healthcare sector. It is the same with teaching. We have people with qualifications who are leaving the country because of that injustice. They feel if that is how the State will treat them they will go elsewhere. We are now paying a price for the very poorly thought out illogical strategy that was put in place back then. We really need to send a very clear signal to those workers that it will be dealt with.

Yes, some remedial action has been taken and I welcome this. I hope this issue will be dealt with in its totality over the course of the next number of years through agreement. I want this to happen. However, what those workers have lost during the period from 2011 until now is potentially lost to them forever, and this has implications for their pensions. This was a real grievance and a real sore, and I do not believe the Government truly understood the grievance those public sector workers felt. We saw it manifested in industrial disputes. It is the case, perhaps, of too little too late in some respects. The Government was warned against this and advised it should take priority in pay talks but it ignored all of that advice. We suffered because of industrial relations issues and disputes. Those workers continue to suffer and only now is the Government getting around to doing something about it. I want it done as quickly as possible so we have justice for those public sector workers who came into the system in 2011 and we have equal pay for equal work in the public service.

Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh

I will continue in the same vein as Deputy Cullinane. There is no excuse at this stage for any further delay in addressing a wrong. Unequal pay for equal work is wrong and it needs to be stopped. We need to compensate or address the anomalies that have been caused since 2011, to ensure people's pensions are not impacted because of cuts to their entrance wage or to their increments. We are not talking about a huge number of public servants. In the totality of the Government's budgetary figures, we are not talking about a huge amount of money. If we address this, it would go some way to addressing some of the industrial unrest. It might not help to reverse fully the problems we have in terms of retention of nurses, midwives or those in the Defence Forces, and there is a number of other related issues. When we have 10,000 nurses and midwives in the health services who do the same work as their colleagues but do so for less, there is, obviously, a draw to other climes where the pay is better, or at least equal, and the conditions are better and there is much less stress because they are more appreciated by the system. The same is true of teachers who, since 2011, have also suffered the same cuts and changes for new entrants. They also need to be addressed. There is nothing more galling than being in one room teaching a class while next door another teacher on a different rate is teaching a class. This has not been addressed. It should have been the first issue addressed with regard to public finances.

Deputy Cowen spoke before us and I heard him state this was a necessary step that had to be taken by his party's Government, which was compounded by the current Government. To this day, I do not believe this and that is a debate we will probably never solve. It is a difference of approach in how to treat public servants and whether we accept their full value or not. There are people in society who do not appreciate public servants and who are forever hammering them and who do not understand that the model which most of us espouse is an increase in public servants, an increase in public service and an increase in the quality of the service. We understand that to do this we have to increase the amount of money invested, but we cannot even begin to think this if we have an unequal system in the first place.

I urge the Minister of State to address this as quickly as possible so he does not have the situation that we have now, whereby the public service is not attractive for people to join, for example, in the nursing profession. Currently, the HSE has over 2,000 fewer nurses than it did in 2007. The population is growing and the complexities of the health service are growing, but we have fewer nurses to address it and there are many other issues in the health service that need to be addressed. We do not have enough GPs currently. What we are dealing with here is trying to ensure the public service is attractive to new entrants. The Defence Forces have had quite a number of arguments with the Minister of State, Deputy Kehoe, on how to retain those who are in the Air Corps, the Defence Forces, soldiers and members of the Naval Service, and this is at crisis point at this stage because there seem to be more leaving than there are joining. We are going from one crisis to another in the Defence Forces, but the same is true of the teaching profession and nursing in particular. This is the urgency to be addressed in this, rather than prevaricating, waiting and delaying in delivering these changes in two, three, four or even five years' time. It needs to be done immediately.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

Deputy Joan Collins has ten minutes.

Deputy Bríd Smith

My name is Bríd Smith.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

I apologise. Deputy Smith is not actually on the system but we will let her in.

Deputy Bríd Smith

I am not on the system.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

No.

Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh

You are here. Go ahead.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

You are here in time and in the queue, so we will let you in, but you are not on the system.

Deputy Mattie McGrath

I hope she is on the register.

Deputy Bríd Smith

Am I taking Deputy Collins's place?

Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh

She is not here so go ahead.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

Go ahead.

Deputy Mattie McGrath

You are taking my place.

Deputy Bríd Smith

I was here before you.

Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh

Go ahead, Deputy Smith.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Frank O'Rourke)

There is no problem.

Deputy Bríd Smith

When I was thinking about this debate I thought about being outside the gates of the Dáil yesterday, where I was with 15 other Deputies and Senators. We conducted a publicity event on repealing the eighth amendment to highlight an aspect of how it impacts a certain cohort of women more than others.

That cohort includes poorer women and women in direct provision. Most people would interpret that as talking about part-time workers, cleaners and people who work in hotels, such as waitresses. One would think these are people who generally earn less than others or who do not earn anything and are dependent on social protection but when I looked at the Department's report on the pay of public sector workers, it is quite astonishing that it admits that 60,000 workers are impacted by discrimination and low pay in the public sector. According to the report, it amounts to almost 20% of all public sector workers.

One would not think that in speaking about low pay it is such a big issue. These people are earning approximately less than €28,000 per year, and it might seem to some people like a big figure. The bar being used is a comparison with the private sector, and the argument is that these people are not so badly off because they are earning around the same or a little less than those in the private sector. Shame on the Department for using such a bar. If one was to forensically root through the reports from the past couple of years, one would find that in analysing the crash in the economy. A narrative was brought about arguing that the problem was not Lehman Brothers, Anglo Irish Bank, the behaviour of bankers, developers and those who squandered the boom and drove the economy into the pits of depression, but actually the public sector. The argument goes that it is bloated, spoiled and there are too many public servants earning too much with pensions that are too high. It was a war on public sector workers conducted by Fianna Fáil and the Greens, followed by Fine Gael and Labour, and it is has really continued up to now.

Unless the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohoe, makes a commitment to abolish the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, legislation and reinstate the pay levels of public sector workers to what they were, all he is saying is that he will continue to "wind down" the measures. I am really tired of listening to him saying he will wind down FEMPI and things will happen gradually. It is a bit like a robber consistently coming to a house, robbing it, albeit by a bit less each time, while saying the wholesale burglary is being wound down. The pay and conditions of public sector workers have been raided to bail out the bankers and developers, as I have said. It is about time to end the narrative.

Looking at the reports, we can see how there is a wholesale attempt to diminish the pay and conditions of public sector workers, and as we predicted at the time, it was adopted as a model by the private sector. The argument now can be that they all earn too little and can barely manage on the salaries they get because of increasing costs for rent and childcare and the increasing inability to afford to buy one's own home. It leaves people like nurses, teachers and sometimes doctors and people in the Defence Forces in a position where they fell pressured and sometimes ashamed that they cannot afford to rent or buy property to the required or expected standard.

These people are struggling on low pay in an economy that is in recovery, although one might think it if one was a public sector worker. We have the scapegoating of the public sector in order to improve the economy. It is about time the Minister and his Department acknowledge that the war on workers must end. FEMPI should end this year and there should be a serious attempt to reinstate the original pay and conditions of those workers, as well as the allowances paid to them. Despite that report after report seems to deny it, the Government is facing an inability to recruit and retain front-line workers in the public sector. In my area last year, the entire Linn Dara unit, one of the only units in the country for adolescents with mental health illness, had to close because the service could not retain psychiatric nurses. Members know that many psychiatric workers do amazing work but the new workers that the Government is trying to recruit and retain struggle to survive on the pay they have. That struggle to survive on the pay provided has a major impact on the services. It is a double whammy and the Government is not just hitting public sector workers but the services they provide as well.

Teachers, nurses, people in the Defence Forces and other public sector workers out there feel they are being robbed and not being paid enough because they must work an extra shift for nothing. They feel they are being treated in a different and unequal way to colleagues. I agree with their sentiments. They must keep up the pressure on the Government to have this ended. We are hitting June again and by next month the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, will have to stand in front of us and justify the continuation of the piece of emergency legislation that has lasted for the longest time in this State. The FEMPI legislation is ridiculously inappropriate now that the economy is growing and in recovery; the Minister boasts about the same quite frequently. Unless there is a serious attempt to end inequality in public sector pay, the people in the Department and the Government will be talking out of both sides of their mouths. These reports would be absolutely meaningless in such a case. I look forward to June's debate on FEMPI in this House and we will see where the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, takes us then.

Deputy Joan Burton

I thank Deputy Mattie McGrath for facilitating me. This is the last day before voting in tomorrow's referendum and many of us have been trying to multitask. The worst example of the Government's failure to address pay inequality in the public service is in the plight of section 39 workers. I have raised this now with the Taoiseach and the Minister, starting when the last Government was coming to the end of its life and I became aware of the fact that it would start becoming an issue. I have also raised it since we left the Government.

There has been a bad strategy with section 39 workers to string out the process so they will remain deprived of the restoration of something they gave up on a voluntary basis at the height of the crisis. I understand the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, has said on a number of occasions that he estimates the cost from studies carried out by the economic evaluation unit in the Department of Finance and others as being somewhere greater than €200 million when all the cuts that section 39 voluntarily took at the country's hour of need are considered.

I have spoken with many chief executive officers and other executives in section 39 organisations. I stress to the Minister of State that they were not left with a voluntary choice as the country was going down the tubes. They were advised by the Health Service Executive, HSE, that they had to cut their budgets in parallel with what was happening in public services generally. It may well have been done by an overall reduction in budget capacity that was reflected in reductions in pay accepted by the workers in those organisations. During our time in the Government, with Deputy Howlin as the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, there was a process of restoration and reinstatement of pay cuts agreed with public service unions. People in section 39 organisations were left out.

Over the course of the past two budgets, Fine Gael was going around saying it had lots of money for tax cuts. While we saw some of that, it did not have enough money to do the decent thing and restore payments to section 39 workers.

There are a few examples of affected workers where there is a particular wrong. The circumstances in this State mean that many hospices have service level agreements with the HSE to provide end-of-life services, which everyone will attest are fantastic compared with the experience of dying in busy general public hospitals with lights, trolleys, emergencies and mixed wards. The hospice movement provides a level of care and comfort for people in their last days and their families, which has been superb. As the Minister for Finance and his Department are well aware, hospice staff have exactly the same qualifications as the staff who work in the HSE. On the north side of Dublin, we have the St. Francis Hospice, which Deputy Broughan and I have spoken about on many occasions. Where nurses, doctors or therapists leave the HSE to become hospice staff, there is a great deal of research to show that providing end-of-life care is a highly stressful and important job for them and their families. Notwithstanding all their great dedication and work and the continual visits to the Oireachtas from hospice groups and section 39 bodies, not only are they not top of the list for pay restoration but little or no progress has been made. In fact, there has been sleight of hand and the use of clever tricks by the Department of Finance to rule such people out. The Department knows that they are highly unlikely to take urgent action which might affect terminally ill patients. Thankfully, hospices are now providing end-of-life care within general hospitals which has led to great improvements in the hospital service. I refer also to employees in organisations such as Rehab which provide essential services.

I do not understand the Department's argument other than as sleight of hand and a case of being overly clever in asserting that section 39 bodies do not fall under general pay restoration. It is a foolish position and the Department must enter clear negotiations. Significant sums have been identified, but Fine Gael is still talking about tax cuts in the forthcoming budget. While the recovery from the crash continues, certain categories of workers are being told that while they made sacrifices in the public interest, the Government is not interested in treating them equally when it comes to the restoration of public service pay. That is simply wrong. We have a process for the Civil Service and we need a very clear process here too. If a nurse or doctor leaves a general hospital to work in a hospice, he or she will be offered a salary which is 2% or, if this continues, 3% lower. People cannot do that, particularly younger staff members. They have to pay rent. I saw an advertisement in the newspaper offering a one-bedroom flat in the Finglas area for €1,400 per month. One could get a two-bedroom apartment in Hollywood for that kind of money. Housing costs are distorting the real value of public service pay. This has happened in Ireland before and it is leading to a crisis among younger people in the public service.

I draw the attention of the Minister of State to a further anomaly, albeit I am sure he is already aware of it from his own constituency. There are young teachers who are now significantly below the pay rate of their counterparts in the profession who decided with their unions at the time of the crash to agree to a reduction structure which affected new entrants more than existing professionals. That decision was made then and large numbers of young people are affected by it now. We need a clear pathway to fair restoration. The #MeToo movement has given rise to a huge change in public consciousness having regard to the general principle of equality between men and women and the need to embed it in our modern society. Public servants, however, are being cut out of the loop on fair and equal pay treatment and there is a similar movement on that issue now. It was good of the Minister of State to set out where we are at in his opening statement, but there was no sense of urgency in what he said. There was no sense of a demand for and recognition of equality. There was no sense that the Government wants to take action. Indeed, we do not even have the figures the Government has to play around with coming up to the budget.