The reforms in question would mean that public sector workers will have to pay 3% more in their pension contributions, work for longer, up until they are 68, and once they do retire receive less money in their pension. The government has called this “fair to taxpayers.” I’m afraid the only government that could see this as “fair” would be a Tory government. Public sector workers pay tax too.
Perhaps if you look at it more closely it is fair, if you listen to the government the private sector’s pensions have already taken a beating so it’s only fair that the public sector do the same. However, the government doesn’t employ the private sector, private companies do, so why are they being led by the hand by people who are out of their control?
Critics of the strike have called it premature, with the government talks with the unions still ongoing, but as Mark Serwotka pointed out on the Today program on Thursday morning, the government aren’t willing to move at all on any of the central issues of this reform. Francis Maude confirmed this, so was the strike premature when the ongoing talks are just that; talks not negotiations. Anyone can turn up to a meeting and talk, but when there’s no negotiating it all seems pretty pointless.
Well, I say anyone can turn up to a meeting and talk, there is someone who seemingly cannot do that. His name is Michael Gove. Yes, the education secretary has spent this past week talking to every media outlet available, barking on about how the public sector is wrong to strike, and how the 'hard-working' British public demand they stay in work. Apparently teachers, nurses, doctors, DWP staff, firemen, coast guards, prison workers and the rest of the public sector aren't deemed 'hard-working'. If Michael Gove spent half as much time talking to the unions as he does talking to the media then we might actually get somewhere!
You know there’s something wrong when the unions are finding out things via the media. You would think they would be kept in the know, but maybe the government doesn’t want that. It seems to me that they’re hell-bent on demonizing the public sector, calling it their ‘duty’ to go to work, lambasting them with rhetoric such as ‘hardworking taxpayers don’t deserve this‘, until everyone in the private sector starts to hate them. I keep having to check this but the public sector pay tax as well don’t they?
And all that hard-work demonizing has worked. We’re now living in a country where the private sector hate the public sector and the public sector in turn hate the private sector. Why? Take teachers for example, doesn’t everyone want our schools to have the very best teachers? Is there anyone out there who wants our classrooms to be filled by useless dimwits, passing on their tiny amount of knowledge to our future generations? I’m hoping not but I wouldn’t be so sure…
Yes, it’s Michael Gove again who came up with the simply brilliant idea of having parents go into schools and run them for the day while the selfish teachers run out on their duties. Have you ever heard a bigger insult to the teaching profession than that? Apparently you don’t need qualifications (or CRB checks for that matter) in order to be a teacher! No…anyone can do it! No wonder he wants to pay them less.
Teachers are one of the most important members of our society, surely it would be nice if they were treated that way. Can you imagine a 68 year old teaching a class of year 8 kids? They’d die of a heart attack! Hang on…I might have just stumbled upon the government’s plan there, they won’t have to pay them a pension if they’re dead I suppose.
I’m growing increasingly worried about the teaching profession. I don’t really think the best candidates are coming in to replace the great retiring teachers, at least at secondary level anyway. The problem is, it’s not really the most appealing profession anymore, gone are the days when you’d teach children and get them ready for the real world, now it seems to be more about childminding than anything else.
The notion of people needing to take time off work because of this inconvenience is also annoying; the kids are in school for a reason! They’re not just there so you can go to work or watch Jeremy Kyle in peace. Not to mention the fact that this strike was planned, meaning parents had ample time to find other arrangements for their kids. What happens when a school closes without notice in the winter because the heater’s broken? You don’t hear Michael Gove standing up for the hard-working taxpayers then do you?
If these reforms go through then all it will do is make the teaching profession even less appealing. Where’s the incentive? The best talent will go into a different sector, and who can blame them?
The big problem is of course that we need to make savings somewhere, and the public sector are, quite frankly, and easy target; especially if you’ve managed to get the private sector to hate them. Without the public support then the reforms will go through, and the government is doing a very good job in demonizing the public sector. Not even Ed Miliband stuck up for them; yet another nail in his big red coffin.
The government has been quick to point out that we simply cannot afford to keep the pensions as they are. Where is their evidence for this? In Lord Hutton’s pensions report. Of course for anyone who knows how to use a search engine this is simply not true. Lord Hutton’s report says nothing about it being unaffordable nor does it say anywhere about it being untenable. In fact it says the cost of pensions in regards to overall GDP will FALL in the next few years.
Evan Davis put this to Francis Maude on the Today program and as Mark Serwotka put it: he’d been rumbled. All this rhetoric about how we simply cannot afford it, how it’s untenable; all of it is a lie. A convenient one that fits into the “we need to make cuts because look what Labour did” narrative. The real reason they want to make the reforms is because they don’t want to afford it, why don't they just come out and say that? Of course Maude denied what Evan Davis was telling him, saying it’s going to cost taxpayers more and they can’t afford it. Astonishing really as it’s there in black and white in Lord Hutton’s report.
The main issue I have with the reforms is that it’s going to hit the poorest and most vulnerable members of our society. Under the new scheme the final pension will be based on your average earnings. That’s fine if you’re a politician, but what if you’re a bin man? It would be absolutely crippling! Don’t these low paid public sector workers deserve a decent pension, simply for getting out of bed and doing a job? As it stands they’ll get the same pension as someone who never does a day’s work in their life. Is that fair? Where is the incentive to actually work?
I think everyone knows changes need to come in. We are living longer so it makes sense to raise the age of retirement, but to make people pay more in, in some cases triple the amount, and then receive less in the end doesn’t seem fair to me. The whole this is very worrying indeed.
So will we have a race to the bottom on our hands here? No, because quite frankly someone has already got there. On Friday morning the Daily Mail used the tragic death of a young girl to gain political points. Sophie Howard was killed in a park on Thursday when a branch broke from a tree and fell on her. Who was at fault? The teachers. Here’s the headline they ran with:
“Teachers’ strike: Sophie Howard, 13, killed by falling branch while school was closed.”
Okay, we all know the Daily Mail is drivel, it doesn’t get it’s nickname ‘The Daily Fail’ for no reason, but this is low; it has to be the lowest I’ve ever seen them stoop. How can a credible journalist write this? It’s embarrassing. A very sad day for journalism.
Even more worrying is that there are comments on the online article agreeing with it. I was stunned to find a tweet from someone the other day saying that teachers have it easy working 9am til 3pm! We all laugh at the Daily Mail, but what they do is obviously working.
A few days have passed now, and it’s gone a bit quiet. The unions are calling it a great success, while the government’s passed it all off as a minor inconvenience, and it doesn’t look like they’ll be moving anywhere in terms of the reforms. I think they’re banking on the public sector workers all losing public support, which unfortunately as they continue to get the private and public sectors raging at each other, will probably happen.
Were the strikes a success? Well the best litmus test for me would be Channel 4 News. When the strikes were proposed a few weeks back Francis Maude and Mark Serwotka clashed on programme with Maude saying half the electorate didn’t vote on the strike action so it isn’t a credible strike (looking forward to the retake of the AV referendum then) and it would fail. Serwotka calmly challenged Maude to come back on Channel 4 News on Thursday 30th June to see the result.
Serwotka was there, but Maude was nowhere to be seen.
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