States pay deal backfires
Friday 23rd January 2009, 2:30PM GMT.
STATES employees are set to get an inflation-busting pay rise this summer despite Guernsey’s RPI being at an all-time low.
With thousands of islanders looking at tiny or even no increases because of the credit crunch, teachers, civil servants and police officers are set to pocket a minimum of 3%.
The deal, which will add millions to the States payroll costs, was concluded at the end of last year – and hailed as a good deal for taxpayers.
The employees, about 2,500 of them, claimed at the time they accepted the need for pay restraint and agreed to accept about 1% below the RPI figure.
But they insisted on inserting a 3% minimum, which the Public Sector Remuneration Committee accepted and hailed as a ‘fair and reasonable’ deal.
The reality is that with inflation set to fall below the current 1.2% next quarter, they are instead in line for a huge increase, perhaps three times more than other islanders can expect.
PSRC chairman Deputy Al Brouard (pictured) was unavailable to comment yesterday and Chief Minister Lyndon Trott, who brokered the zero-10 package which was based on restraint in public expenditure, declined to comment.
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When was the last time Civil Servants got a pay rise? It seems that when the island is financially successful they get RPI and when there are fallow years they are expected to get below RPI. With no bonus’s, a contributary pension and frequent pay cuts it is no wonder no one wants to work for the States!!
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“frequent pay cuts!?????
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This is a very misleading article from the Guernsey Press. It fails to mention that the headline rate of inflation at 1.2% includes mortgages. Only those who have a mortgage linked to the base rate will have benefitted. All of those empolyees who have a fixed rate mortgage or rent property will be affected by the underlying rate excluding mortgages of 4.6%, so will be financially worse-off. When the GP interviewed people in the high street they also failed to mention this fact, which caused people to make comments based on only part of the facts.
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I must agree with George. The current underlying rate is still 4.6%, it is only that the cost of mortgages and borrowing which has been reduced by the reduction in the UK’s Bank rate that the RPI figure has been reduced. It would be interesting to see what the RPI figure reverts to in March when the effects of those cuts will affect the RPI figure less. As the Civil Servants ‘pay rise’ is normally based on the March RPI and not effective until May does this headline not jump the gun in assuming the RPI will still be at a low at that time.
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Regardless of the ‘underlying rate’ of inflation the States employees pay deal is based on the actual RPI (now standing at 1.2% and less by March which is what the pay deal is negotiated on). Clearly Al Broaurd is another Deputy out of his depth, this time as PSRC Chairman.
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What the heck is going on with this Press, all you seem to do is half truth sensationalisation for the front page.Is the editor running a one man war on the civil service.For his information like it or not all States employees do a very essential job and keep this island ticking. Why dont you turn your venom on the financial fatcats who despite collectively getting the world into reccession are still getting large bonuses. To me this is the real insult to normal working folk. Do States employees get a 13th month salary as well as a fat bonus? Of course not so get real.
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Oh lets all have a go at the civil servants. They dont get bonuses, they have to pay into a pension and they dont get perks.
If they constantly take less than RPI rises they are going to fall so behind how will they afford rent and to buy houses, or do we want to put more strain on States Housing by having to accommodate people who could potentially afford private housing.
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What a surprise! The anti-states media twisting a story to make the public believe that it is the civil servants themselves who have instigated a ‘minimum’ 3% rise this year.
The very fact the RPI is ‘supposedly’ currently at 1.2% is also just as misleading as George rightly states, the underlying figure is 4.6%.
When everything is taken into account, civil servants, public sector employees and many others will still not relatively be on a ‘par’ with the real cost of living.
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I agree with George. The GP article is misleading and inflammatory at the very least.
The headline rate of inflation should always include the cost of mortgages/housing, as in Guernsey it is a major factor. Take that out and the whole issue is misleading. As mentioned previously the only people who are winning with the low interest rates are those with tracker mortgages – the rest of us are still paying high rates of interest or high rents.
Food, travel and daily living costs continue to rise affecting all but the very rich.
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The finance sector (and their lackey the Guernsey Press Editor) didn’t want the public sector to share in the good times, only to share in the coming bad ones. If people think Civil Servants have got it so good there are always vacancies they could apply for…
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The 3% rise we should receive this year might go some way towards covering the potential bank interest we lost whilst waiting for our annual RPI increase for 2008 to be settled……….. I’ve no sympathy for the PSRC on this one – EVERY year its the same story, we always end up waiting months for our money and when the back pay does finally arrive the taxman seems to take a large chunk of it!!
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When times are good Sates workers get RPI, perhaps 0. something above, When times are bad they are expected to go below RPI.
RPI wage ajustments are a year behind the previous RPI adjustment so States workers are always playing catch up even when they get RPI.
So when they get RPI plus a 0. amount in the good years does this ever make up for what they’ve lost in the bad years. I think not!.
The Island’s private sector taxpayers has always got States workers on the cheap while demanding the highest possible wages for themselves.
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Well given the current financial clime, all you hard done by civil servants can go back to being smug safe in the knowledge that you will always get a pay rise, take no responsibility for any of your decisions – good or bad, your failing pension fund will be topped up by tax payers and it is final salery and you will never lose your job no matter how bad you are as an employee – oh, and the CSB writes your employment contract – nice – and the politicinas don’t have the balls to rationalise any of the inherent waste in your cosy system.
What were you saying again about how bad your lot was?
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Cod,
As I say, if you think the Civil Service is that cushy you should apply for a job in it! Why wouldn’t you?
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I think cod should head off back to the sea as the knowledge in their post was about as well informed as a bag of cod and chips!
Cod seems to be under the impression that a civil servants ‘lot’ is somewhere way above that in the private sector.
Indeed it is equally the majority of jobs in the private sector who will always get a pay rise, have little job responsibility, civil servants are tax payers as much as the next person, have to contribute to their own final salary pensions, do lose their jobs for being a bad employee, all employers write employee contracts (not sure of their point about that), and a zero growth policy is evidence of rationalising waste in this apparent ‘cosy’ system.
How more mis-informed could you be? No doubt you are a professional armchair reporter.
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Nice to see you completley avoided the non civil servant tax payer topping up your pension.
Stewart Falla once said he wasn’t sure who employed the civil servants – sorry state of affairs. Bullet proof jobs, self protecting and impossible to get sacked for being rubbish.
Why haven’t I become a civil servant? I may just apply – its a safer place to be with a guaranteed job, great benefits and total security, unlimited pay budgets and no real bosses.
Sounds great
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All you civil service bashers – why don’t you come on in and join the wonderful world of public service utopia where there is money in abundance, no responsibility and massive pensions. Pah! The reality is that most people work very hard, do have responsibility and do a very good job for this island.
As others have said before there are plenty of vacancies – if life was that cushy the public sector should never have to advertise for licence holder positions….. which is not the case at all.
We don’t have bonus schemes, medical insurance or any other perks that the private sector might have as routine. The final salary pension scheme is not a perk – it is something we pay for all our working life. The fact that the finance companies are finding it a bit more difficult at the moment is not the fault of the public sector: It is worldwide and you have to learn to pull in the reins and stop blaming everyone else for your problems.
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The CSB are civil cervants, or did that fact completeky pass you by? You write your own contracts, you employ youselves.
as for the zero growth policy, well that’s been exposed as as an utter sham.
I’m here all week ;)
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Cod – who are the CSB?
Civil Servants are employees of the Policy Council – they are a group of politicians in case you weren’t aware of that.
Just goes to show how out of date and out of touch you are!
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Your point is Cod?
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Cod, don’t you think that if the Civil Servants wrote their own contract they might factor in a much higher salary complete with a couple of healthy bonuses each year, maybe a free health care scheme, cheap or free gym membership etc?
Oh sorry, almost forgot the company car and cheaper loans/mortgages.
It must be so tough working in the finance sector!
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Be nice to each other people. We’ve all had it incredibly easy over the past 10 or 15 years. A consequence of reduced income will be taxpayers demanding more efficiencies from government and government, hopefully, recognising this. As for the private sector, public sector employees don’t think for a second that it will not effect us. It will and it is.
It’s how we deal with this new reality that is important. Government has to make efficiencies, the public need to keep up the pressure. Getting personal with each other isn’t going to help; realising that efficiencies affect real people will.
Difficult and uncomfortable days indeed.
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The missus just got an 8k bonus for being in a private sector job for just 6 months. Oh and she has just got a 3k pay rise. Dont see CS getting that sort of deal.
Fair play to them i say, they deserve it having being screwed over for so long.
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Has it ever occurred to you your wife might have earned it through being good at her job?
Why would the CS get that kind of deal, or anyone else in the private sector? What a strange rationale.
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Do people honestly think that staff working in the public sector do not work hard enough to deserve bonuses? There are many good staff who work over and above their job description, for long hours with no overtime pay (it is against civil service rules to pay senior staff overtime). There are staff who save or earn the island thousands if not millions of pounds through good research and use of resources. Of course the public rarely hear of these things – bad news always makes better headlines doesn’t it?
You obviously have no idea of what goes on in the real world of the public sector. Perhaps the politicians need to start issuing quarterly bulletins about their perspective departments and what is going on.
My children work in the private sector and from day one were given health insurance, travel allowances, free training including paid study time off and also earning healthy bonuses already – and they are very junior staff (i.e. under training) so it is nothing to do with experience – it is pure and simply that the finance industries they are working in are continuing to make healthy profits and want to keep their staff.
We see the retail sector imploding and I feel desperately sorry for the staff in this sector. Hopefully the island will be able to re-employ the staff elsewhere and reduce our reliance on licence holders.
When will people realise that it is the public sector workers who are keeping this island stable allowing the finance houses to continue making large profits, staff to keep their jobs and enabling them to attract new business to the island – despite the credit crunch.
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Merlin With the greatest respect, without the taxes raised from the private sector, there wouldn’t be any public sector.
“(it is against civil service rules to pay senior staff overtime)” As it is in the private sector; when you get to a certain level, you are paid a salary and expected to go the extra mile.
Playing ‘trumps’ without a full understanding of how each sector works is unhelpful and rather silly.
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I’m concerned that this pay rise is simultaneously hyper-inflationary and paradoxical. The story behind the story really is that the inflation figures actually seemed to be produced by someone in Frossard house shaking a ‘magic 8-ball’
Does anyone else see the irony here in that ‘backfires’ are most commonly experienced in high performance engines?
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Jackie,
With the greatest respect this is a bit of a chicken and egg situation isn’t it? Which came first? Before the finance sector hit Guernsey big time i.e. in the 1970′s the public sector was here and working. We have always needed civil servants, public service employees, teachers, police, medical staff, nurses etc etc and we always will. Now i agree we may not need as many but that is another argument! I am not disputing that the finance sector are important to the island, i just dislike the way the the public sector are apparently being hammered by these employees as being given a job for life with no responsibility and they can coast along and then retire to utopia on a final salary pension (how many of these final salaries are generous is another argument)!
If the finance sector walked away from Guernsey en-masse there is no doubt that the island would suffer as the previous big earners like tourism and horticulture are no longer around – but the public sector would still be the foundation of the islands workforce. Zero Ten is going to impact on this island and is one of the reasons the finance sector will not leave the island – who would want to move from here when they are not required to pay any tax on their profits?
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