Texts and emails, Thursday 11 March 2010
Topic: Public sector work to rule
Panellists: Louise O'Donnell (IMPACT), Moira Mulcahy (ASTI), Annette Dolan (TUI), Harry Browne (DIT) and Cllr Mick Barry (Socialist Party)
If the public sector get back the cuts in wages will the social welfare also get their cuts in money back?
Bernadette
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Any danger 2 patients is caused by our minister for health’s mismanagement.
Allison
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Yet another night of rubbishing the Catholic Church. Your panel is bias and anti Church. May God forgive u all.
Noel
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Why not Vincent give Mary Harney a call in New Zealand to wish her a happy birthday today. And tell her that public anything but happy with her away while the mess of Tallaght hospital continues.
Anne Ryan, Kilkenny
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The real problem for the Teachers is they along with a huge proportion of civil servants are the biggest buy to let landlords in the State. They are financially ruined due to their investment in properties and they now expect the tax payers to bail them out because of their GREED as they cant afford their multiple mortgage repayments.
Anthony, Rathgar
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Those greedy teachers don’t care about pupils just themselves. 1000 have retired early to burden the private sector even further.
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Tell them we're at economic war for survival and those overpaid secure employees can go to hell, and the goverment is me-the taxpayer.
John Brodbin, Dublin 14
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Let the public service go on strike, let them lose their lavish homes that they bought with taxpayers money. Let them out until they have as little as the rest of us.
Dan, Kerry.
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Those who can. Do. Those who can’t. Teach. Those who can’t teach, become active in their trade union. Harsh but true.
Alan, Sligo
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The public sector has no clue as to the stark reality of the economy, and the strain being experienced by private employers and their staff. They are not public-spirited in any meaning of the concept and just anger us more with every day that passes.
U. Gogarty, Co. Meath
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I'm ashamed of having been a teacher. Teachers have secure permanent pensionable jobs. My solicitor daughter lost her job before Christmas.
Mary, retired teacher
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The American Census Bureau will this May hire up to 750,000 new employees and will thus bring down the US unemployment rate by half a percentage point. The government here should be using the public sector in a similar way and grow our way out of this recession instead of pursuing their current strategy of pay cuts which will only deepen the crisis here.
Alan, Raheny
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Almost all the union leaderships want to return to social partnership which only increased gap between rich and poor. only all out indefinite strike will reverse cuts.
Kieran McNulty, people before profit, tralee.
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Public Sector did NOT cause problems but ALL suffered cuts. Some private sector caused problems but only a small % suffer! And people wonder why Public Sector are angry!
P Murphy, Dublin 9
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Did the unions storm TV3 tonight? Disgraceful unbalanced coverage. When are the government going to fire the staff in passport office and HSE for not doing their jobs? This selfish behaviour by those insulated from the recession is not acceptable. The relevant minister should at least doc their salary by 25%.
Seamus, Dublin
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As a community care worker in the health service and an IMPACT member, I and many of my colleagues feel left down by government and union. Neither care about the people we serve or the people who serve them. Hospitals are all that count in the health service and maybe education after that, the children and people needing social workers, psychologists, speech and language don't count. Work to rule means little to us, we respond as our ethics dictate not finances.
Niamh, Tipperary
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Irish teachers are the highest paid for the least amount of work according to the OECD. Lecturers work an average of 16 hrs per week. So what are these people striking for?
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It's tough being an ordinary blue collar non-union worker in this country when you have both the Government and the Unions squeezing you. It's bad enough being screwed by Builders, Bankers, Brian's and Berties and now the Bully Unions who march to the sound of their own pomp and egotism, GOD HELP the ordinary people on the street.
James Keogh, Galway.
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As a member of the public frontline sector, I want our union reps to discuss stopping further cuts & get pay restored later when the country’s finance has improved but no more cuts. It is in the managerial sectors & their mismanagement of public funds too many layers.
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If the government enforced compulsory redundancies for the entire public service and rehired based on ability and desire to work for above average salaries we might save the country from a prolonged downward path. Interestingly the entire public service unemployed would not even equal the total of the private sector unemployment!
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What the banks started the public service unions seem intent on finishing, ie, sabotaging the state. Its economic treason.
Sean McNally
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I am a public service employee earning less than e30,000 per year. I have lost income and child support but my husband is self employed and has taken a pay cut of 50% he has also lost most of the value of his pension. When are the unions going to face reality and when are they going to take pay cuts.
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How many bloody unions are there in this country? I spent nearly 30 yrs in the UK and have been back home about 7 years and I am sick to the teeth hearing every day about unions. What this country needs is another Margaret Thatcher, because as much as she was loathed among the Irish you have to admire her for tackling the unions and getting Britain working. Brian Cowan and Mary Coughlan may have been good for fixing fences for farmers but how they ever got to be leaders of the country is a joke.
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We should implement a further paycut on teachers to match the reduction in their output. They are already overpaid and greedily choose an increase in their pay during the Tiger rather than additional teachers or resources for children. Shame on them for their continued selfish behaviour.
Seamus, Rathfarnham
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