Anyone else in the public sector?

Message

#1 Post by **Kwackerz** » Mon Jun 28, 2010 9:12 pm

Time to have your tuppence-worth on how we can save money.

http://spendingchallenge.hm-treasury.gov.uk/

Gio · #2 Post by **Gio** » Wed Jul 07, 2010 10:11 pm

Can't wait for 8th July

HowardQ · #3 Post by **HowardQ** » Wed Jul 07, 2010 11:11 pm

Just the three of us at our house.
Me for 36 years.
The wife for 20 odd years.
About 10 years for my daughter.
With a bit of luck we could all be out of a job later this later.
But don't worry the Bwankers can all keep their jobs and bonusses if a million Public Sector workers go down the road.
P.S. Did you hear about the proposed emergency change in law to change our conditions of employment, cut silly things like redundancy payments and reduce our gold plated pensions.
Senior Civil Servants may get "gold plated pensions" but as an IT manager and Principal Local Government Officer for all these years, we Feckin don't.
In any case Gordon sold all our gold years ago, so there is nothing to plate them with!

Nooj · #4 Post by **Nooj** » Wed Jul 07, 2010 11:59 pm

Plasticote do a semi-convincing gold spray paint if that helps. I'd rather have my pension done in a nice black powder coat.

BikerGran · #5 Post by **BikerGran** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:17 am

I've got one of those gold-plated pensions - that's why I'm still working part-time although I'm supposed to be retired and in spite of the arthritis; it makes me mad every time I hear that phrase!

snapdragon · #6 Post by **snapdragon** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 10:13 pm

'bout time the press started revealing what 'real' public sector workers are on instead of admirals and 'senior civil service' who are on a different planet when it comes to salary and pension

Gio · #7 Post by **Gio** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 10:33 pm

I expect its a darn sight more than anyone in a similar job in the private sector.

D-Rider · #8 Post by **D-Rider** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 10:47 pm

Gio wrote:I expect its a darn sight more than anyone in a similar job in the private sector.

I don't !

In my experience it's usually quite the opposite - though I dare say for some jobs it's better and others it's worse.

Aladinsaneuk · #9 Post by **Aladinsaneuk** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:04 pm

nurses are on 2 thirds final salary if they have done their full superann contributions

BikerGran · #10 Post by **BikerGran** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:21 pm

Maybe but how many of us have worked at the place long enough to get a full pension? People just assume that because you're 'public sector' you must be rolling in it. Grrrr.

HowardQ · #11 Post by **HowardQ** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:29 pm

Sorry Gio but you are talking complete bollox here.
We have a perfect example at a Local Authority I know well. They went down the last right wing Government's road over the last 10 years under Tony.
All our IT services, all procurement for everything, all call centres and customer service centres and many other things have been run for more than seven years by a joint venture company. A nice political half way house between outsourcing and doing it your self. The Authority's partner used to do TV advertising using a lady called Beatie.
All the old council staff do all the work and get paid much lower salaries. We now have probably 50 people above what was the highest officer before these changes, nobody knows what most of these people do. All the staff on this side earn at least 3 times the salaries of the managers from the council side, some of these people have been earning more than Tony did!
All this paid for by the council tax payers.
These people may possibly pay a slightly higher pension contribution on the employee side than we do, but the fact they earn 3 or 4 times as much means they will end up with much higher pensions than the council staff do. Even though we are in a partnership, these people usually charge the Authority £1k a day to work on projects or come to meetings.
Whenever elements of public sector work are privatised at this level the companies coming in to do the work make massive profits and usually don't improve things in the long term.
They would not take the contracts if they did not make lots of money.
The same applies to all the PFI schools and hospitals.

HowardQ · #12 Post by **HowardQ** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:33 pm

Aladinsaneuk wrote:nurses are on 2 thirds final salary if they have done their full superann contributions

Local Authority staff are on much less!
After more than 38 years I will get well under half.

BikerGran · #13 Post by **BikerGran** » Thu Jul 08, 2010 11:34 pm

Alsp PFI police buildings!

Aladinsaneuk · #14 Post by **Aladinsaneuk** » Fri Jul 09, 2010 5:36 am

nod howard

but also depends on what the level of pay is - a generic staff nurse is likely on around 25k....

MartDude · #15 Post by **MartDude** » Fri Jul 09, 2010 9:54 am

Gio wrote:I expect its a darn sight more than anyone in a similar job in the private sector.

I may be a little out of date here - I quit Local Govt. (middle management) in '96 - but public sector jobs have generally always been lower paid than comparable public sector posts - about two-thirds - three-quarters. However, that differential was compensated, to a degree, by better conditions of service - annual leave, pensions, security. But it would appear that those 'compensations' are now being eroded; I can't see rank & file and middle management vacancies attracting high quality candidates in the future.

Many of us in Local Government were genuinely committed to the concept of 'public service' - we felt that we were contributing to the wellbeing of the communities we served. That too has been steadily eroded over the the last two decades - part of the reason I left.