The betrayal of a public sector pay freeze

[Ori3]

Yes, we're facing the biggest economic crisis since peacetime. Yes money has to be found. But as a first measure, why instantly freeze the pay of teachers, police, firefighters, council staff and civil servants; key-workers who have risked so much during the pandemic.

These are the people holed up in a room looking after 30+ kids per day, supporting vulnerable people in social care, helping businesses access the furlough scheme, supplying universal credit, dealing with household emergencies, and tackling an increase in demand for urgent care services.

And their reward for helping to keep the show going? The certainty of a pay freeze for the next however many years and a conciliatory pat-on-the-head as added bonus. It's a joke.

And the awful irony of it all is that these are the sectors that protect most vulnerable and disadvantaged in our society, alongside looking after the nation's kids. They're the ones gluing it all together. Shut the schools and you've got a crisis. Stop social care and you've got a crisis. Get rid of the police force = crisis. Oh and firefighters? Who needs them? Council workers? Well all they do is push pieces of paper around and refuse to answer calls?! Get rid of them too.

In the words of Fight Club's Chuck Palahniuk:

“Remember this. The people you're trying to step on, we're everyone you depend on. We're the people who do your laundry and cook your food and serve your dinner. We make your bed. We guard you while you're asleep. We drive the ambulances. We direct your call. We are cooks and taxi drivers and we know everything about you. We process your insurance claims and credit card charges. We control every part of your life.

We are the middle children of history, raised by television to believe that someday we'll be millionaires and movie stars and rock stars, but we won't. And we're just learning this fact. So don't fuck with us.”

I am public sector and also a trade union rep. It absolutely wouldn’t sit right with me to have a pay rise next year because there are SO many people suffering far worse fates than I am. My job is as secure as they come, my pay is better than average, my pension is decent and safe and I’ve been able to go to work throughout all of this.

Whilst I do agree that we are an easy target and there are many other ways of saving money I am MORE than happy to not have a pay rise.

@shropshire11

I think most people value front-line workers, but public sector pay has to bear some relation to private sector pay (i.e. the people whose taxes actually cover the costs).

In the private sector, millions have lost their jobs or been furloughed, and very very few will be getting pay rises. They also receive substantially fewer holidays, inferior pensions, etc.

In this context, there has to be some fairness, or else you have a two-tier economy where people working for the government enjoy safe well-paid jobs and everyone else works hard for less money to pay for them. That isn't sustainable.

Please could someone tell me where the safe and well-paid jobs are? I work in the public sector and I want one of them. I'd also like pointing to the "most people" who value us, because it certainly isn't noticeable. Oh yes, a lot of people stood and clapped on doorsteps for a few weeks. But virtue signalling for your own benefit and valuing me for the work I do are very different things.

This year (April) is the first pay rise that most of us have seen for many years; and hundreds of public sector jobs are being lost this very minute, on top of the thousands that have been cut and cut and cut for the last ten years or so. My employer employed the equivalent of 16,500 people in 2009. In March 2020 it was 11,200, and only last month another 200 went, with more jobs going next month and in March. Safe? Well-paid? valued? Don't make me laugh...

And btw, to all those who are suggesting that the private sector workers pay for the public sector through their taxes, you do know that public sector workers pay taxes too. It isn't a favour. Services are also commodities, and there is no difference between paying for a school or a care home, and paying for a tomato or a new TV - you pay for what you get.

hamstersarse

If you can name me one 'part' of the public sector that did not change the level of service for the worse throughout all of this, I would be surprised.

MoD

@thatwouldbeanecumenicalmatter

Army recruitment was completely frozen for about 6 months cos of covid

Private sector perfectly capable of continuing with recruitment, e.g. Tesco

I assumed that most of the public sector is paid for by taxes on businesses not from the taxation of either public or private sector employees.

I work in retail and won’t be getting a pay rise this year. I assumed very few people would be getting one because the economy has just been trashed. Surely we were all expecting this?

The clapping was for all essential workers, by the way, not for the public sector.

[quote hamstersarse]@thatwouldbeanecumenicalmatter

Army recruitment was completely frozen for about 6 months cos of covid

Private sector perfectly capable of continuing with recruitment, e.g. Tesco[/quote]
The British Army has achieved "close to 100%" of its recruitment target of personnel joining the service for the first time since 2012.

www.forces.net/news/covid-how-has-coronavirus-affected-army-recruitment

@GordonsAliveAndEatsPies and yet, the government rarely accepted the recommendations in full of independent pay review panels for other areas of the public sector like the MOD etc.

So you've shock done your job as expected during the last year, not been made redundant, or asked to take a significant pay cut but instead in a global pandemic and shit storm that is Brexit you expect to be rewarded with a payrise?

Give your head a wobble. And be grateful you have a f* job

@VinylDetective

Every single part of the public sector tried to close themselves down, stop the services they are paid to provide citing Covid for the reason for everything, mostly tenuously

Tell that to my stepdaughter who’s pulled 12 hour shifts in ITU in hot, clumsy PPE since March. And come home and cried almost every day. Some people haven’t got a clue.

I did use my words carefully

Every single part of the public sector tried to close themselves down

And the NHS is definitely one part which has not been functioning and providing the services they are paid to do - GP appointments, routine appointments, cancer screening, I could go on.

There may be areas within the health service that have been working very hard, like your DSD, but it is not across the full service provision, what the public pay the NHS to do.

Public or private sector - we’re all being shafted while the rich get richer. Spot on
I am private sector and believe the public sector should get a pay rise - I also hope the private sector is looked after. It shouldn’t be a race to the bottom.
The 1% are rubbing their hands with glee

Public sector workers seem to moan about the conditions but not many seem to actually leave the public sector to do a comparable job in the private sector....

From what I can see, the scrabble seems to be the other way round, many in the private sector would prefer a lower pay packet for job security and a guaranteed pension.

@CakeRequired it’s not bullshit. You might want to check your facts. Try reading this fir a start point. HTH

www.theipsa.org.uk/publications/consultations/review-of-mps-pay-and-pensions/

@thatwouldbeanecumenicalmatter

Public sector workers also pay taxes, think some people forget that.

No one’s a saying they don’t. But it’s just recycled money. Private sector generates the GDP for the tax to be generated in the first place. All in all, getting private sector growth going has to be number one priority.

@notanothertakeaway

Some public sector workers have worked hard and put themselves at risk

But not all of them

And many people in private sector have lost their jobs completely, so public sector staff are fortunate to have secure employment and gold standard pension schemes

Most public sector workers have put themselves at risk, and if the public sector is soo attractive why aren't you working for it. My dd works for the private sector and has a company car, pay rises every year and earns almost as much as I do after nearly 40 years in the public sector. She also received large bonuses in the past and has all the same benefits as I do, so it's not always the case that the private sector has worse pay and conditions. At the moment she is also on her 2nd period of furlough on full pay while I am still working flat out.

I was in private sector but recently made redundant. Find it difficult to have any sympathy for a lack of pay rise in the public sector.

@sst1234 and how do you get private sector growth if you haven't got someone educating those future private sector workers, their children, looking after them with a health service, policing the streets to keep them safe, no sector can work in isolation, each needs the other. So the tit for tat conversation this thread is descending into is completely moot and as already pointed out, exactly what the government wants.

What is pissing me off the most about this is I have no idea if this affects me. I work in NHS admin and over the 24k threshold. Some reports say no increase, just doctors, nurse and those who are under 24k. Other say it is all NHS staff. Does this mean the annual increase in line with inflation in April or are incremental increases scrapped too? I could accept a pay freeze if I actually knew I was included. The vagueness is the most annoying thing.

41, it isn’t tit for tat. It is just explaining economics, surely? Nobody is saying we should shut schools down, just that the cost of public sector pay has to be related to the wealth of the nation, which will depend on how much economic growth happens in the private sector.

It isn’t a moral argument about which sector is more important; it’s just about how we make money as a country.

My dd works for the private sector and has a company car, pay rises every year and earns almost as much as I do after nearly 40 years in the public sector. She also received large bonuses in the past and has all the same benefits as I do, so it's not always the case that the private sector has worse pay and conditions. At the moment she is also on her 2nd period of furlough on full pay while I am still working flat out.

Are you doing the same job? If not, then it's not comparable is it? And if you are, then to use your own point, why aren't you working in the private sector? If she's on her second period of furlough, that means she would have been made redundant if not for the scheme and is highly at risk, while you've got a job.

I also know many public sector workers - including council workers, doctors and more - who were working from home through a lot of this, especially the early lockdown. Doesn't mean they had it easier, but I'm tired of hearing that somehow public sector workers are uniquely hard done by. Just look at the sick pay policies or pension schemes or hours expected to see the difference in many of the jobs open, private sector has a lot of challenges too.

And I'm tired of the people.saying public service workers pay tax too - their incomes come from the tax in the first place, in many ways it's just an inefficient way of cycling money around inside the public system.

I’m very disillusioned with my career anyway (teacher) and this has just sealed the deal for me. We are putting our house on the market, selling as soon as possible, buying a much smaller place mortgage free and then I’m quitting. I have had a guts full.

All those who are jealous of public sector worker, NHS England is currently short of 36 000 nurses. Do yourselves a favour,
pay for your training for the next 3 years, then you can have access to a gold-plated pension.

@Stripesnomore it's tit for tat in that this thread is oversimplifying a more nuanced discussion, you simply can't generalise every role by whether it is private or public. Some areas of the public sector generate huge sums of money, some areas have hugely struggled themselves with lack of income, some areas of the private sector have hugely benefited. It's just utterly ridiculous the discussion is going to the depths private vs public, or trying to say public sector jobs are safe etc etc, we're talking about thousands of organisations with very different financial models.

As I said earlier, Sunak very deliberately mentioned the private sector when freezing public sector pay, he's not stupid, he knew it would incite discussions like this so people got angry at each other rather than looking to the government.

As I said earlier, Sunak very deliberately mentioned the private sector when freezing public sector pay, he's not stupid, he knew it would incite discussions like this so people got angry at each other rather than looking to the government.

This is classic Tories. I utterly despise them because of how they have pitted each other against each other so people ignore their own incompetence. The fact of the matter is, we had years of austerity which did not clear the deficit and now we are reverting back to it. If it had worked in the first place and the government adequately prepared for a pandemic (which they did apparently, and pandemics are inevitable) then we wouldn't have had to resort to this.

But they will get what they pay for unfortunately. I am sick of this cycle, so will be planning on going elsewhere when the jobs market picks up again.

I believe NHS staff are exempt from the pay freeze? I don't want to take away what many (not all!!) NHS staff have done during the pandemic, but it is a kick in the teeth for other public sector workers who have been front line (and exposed to the virus, of which there are many) and are going to be completely overlooked for their efforts. It's an outrage.