Some thoughts from a Civil Servant

[Ekbalco]

With the report of An Bord Snip due shortly I have read much about how much the public service is costing the country and how cuts need to be made as we all earn 50k a year for doing nothing.

Just to give people a little food for thought to put things into perspective.

* I earn after tax 20,600 a year. This vast salary will likely be diminished after the budget in December
* I work a 40 hour week with a break in the morning and an hour for lunch. Same as the private sector
* Expenses??. Yes I pay for everything out of my own pocket.
* I along with my collegues work as hard as anyone else. Theres no slacking.

I'm tired of being demonised by sections of the media who seem to think if you get rid of us the countrys ills will be on the way to being solved. Yes the wage bill goes down but since we're the frontline its Joe Public who'll also feel it.

If there are any more pay cuts forced on us then I will be forced out of the service and most likely have to emigrate.

Just something to ponder when you hear about all the big money we're on

[Digout]

With the report of An Bord Snip due shortly I have read much about how much the public service is costing the country and how cuts need to be made as we all earn 50k a year for doing nothing.

Just to give people a little food for thought to put things into perspective.

* I earn after tax 20,600 a year. This vast salary will likely be diminished after the budget in December
* I work a 40 hour week with a break in the morning and an hour for lunch. Same as the private sector
* Expenses??. Yes I pay for everything out of my own pocket.
* I along with my collegues work as hard as anyone else. Theres no slacking.

I'm tired of being demonised by sections of the media who seem to think if you get rid of us the countrys ills will be on the way to being solved. Yes the wage bill goes down but since we're the frontline its Joe Public who'll also feel it.

If there are any more pay cuts forced on us then I will be forced out of the service and most likely have to emigrate.

Just something to ponder when you hear about all the big money we're on

What grade are you on? What department? And if your such a hard workers, why not try your hand in the private sector where the rewards are massive?

[wombat]

The public service is much larger than the civil service. Most of the waste takes place in the semi state/ quango part. The civil service is not huge but people need to be moved between departments more frequently. The main function of the civil service is to administer govt. policy. As was seen by the telephone licence inquiry, the job of the civil service is to administer rules, set by politicians, in a fair manner and to ensure that people's money is not misused. That said, the job of a civil servant in the dept. of Education is no different to the job of one in the dept. of Health. Why is it so difficult to move sections from one dept. to another? The problem in the public service is not that people don't work hard, its that many of the jobs don't need to be done.

[ellie08]

The problem is not the ordinary workers. I'm sure they work very hard. It's middle managements that are getting paid too much for doing feck all.

[Victor Meldrew]

I know. In fact most adults on the site know this.

The dole queues are full of people who worked hard on modest wages and who were let go because their employers could not afford to pay their wages as sales fell.

It's not personal that people want the public sector pay bill cut, it's just where FF's policies have taken us. There are ~ 70K employees that were added to the payroll paid for with non recurring taxes. This is analogous to DOT-COM's burning up the venture capital and going under.

Ordinary private sector workers don't get the golden parachutes and neither will/can public sector workers. Look up the org chart and things get different. Look across at your union mandarins and it's different again.

P.S. Welcome to the site.

[Skint]

With the report of An Bord Snip due shortly I have read much about how much the public service is costing the country and how cuts need to be made as we all earn 50k a year for doing nothing.

Just to give people a little food for thought to put things into perspective.

* I earn after tax 20,600 a year. This vast salary will likely be diminished after the budget in December
* I work a 40 hour week with a break in the morning and an hour for lunch. Same as the private sector
* Expenses??. Yes I pay for everything out of my own pocket.
* I along with my collegues work as hard as anyone else. Theres no slacking.

I'm tired of being demonised by sections of the media who seem to think if you get rid of us the countrys ills will be on the way to being solved. Yes the wage bill goes down but since we're the frontline its Joe Public who'll also feel it.

If there are any more pay cuts forced on us then I will be forced out of the service and most likely have to emigrate.

Just something to ponder when you hear about all the big money we're on

Sorry to sound unsympethetic but I am. The Cork Examiner had a headline today that the average wage was over fifty grand, you have a bullet proof pension and can come into work drunk for a month before being sacked. I've taken a 10% pay reduction and very narrowly avoided being sacked earlier this year and by the way I'm on below the average industrial wage and didn't get benchmarking... yes I work in the private sector

[adamirer]

What grade are you on? What department? And if your such a hard workers, why not try your hand in the private sector where the rewards are massive?

and if its such a doss job why dont you try your hand n the civil service, where the rewards are massive.

[toughbutfair]

Are you just out of university? (did you go?)

When people talk about the cost of the public sector, they are talking about the sector as a whole.

If you earn 20k after tax, chances are you pay shag all tax anyway so if you are told to make a contribution to the running of the country - I don't see how you can complain.

[Digout]

and if its such a doss job why dont you try your hand n the civil service, where the rewards are massive.

Oh I did, as a consultant, got a good few quid also, but could only handle the braindeadedness for a certain amount of time.

[CookieMonster]

I'm always surprised at the "civil servants earn thirty billion euro a year and work three hours a week" figures. I used to be one and while I didn't work all that hard I'll admit I was not on a huge salary at all nor was anybody else save the management staff but they did work hard.