Minister for Finance Michael Noonan has ruled out reversing a 5% pay cut for around 17,000 low-paid school secretaries and non-teaching staff imposed at the beginning of 2011. Around 500 secretaries belonging to the IMPACT trade union have already voted to take industrial action over the pay cut. They point out that their pay is being cut despite the fact that they do not enjoy any of the benefits of public servants, including pensions - and that many are earning little more than the minimum wage. The row arose after the Department of Education and Skills instructed all schools and VECs to impose pay cuts of 5% on up to 17,000 low-paid non-teaching staff, to match last year's public service pay cuts. However, an anomaly arose for school secretaries hired after 1990 - as they are employed by individual schools and VECs, and are paid out of a grant to school boards.
English: http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0324/secretaries.html
This article was published in the Collective Bargaining Newsletter. It aims to facilitate information exchange between trade unions and to support the work of ETUC's collective bargaining committee. For more information, please contact the editor Maarten van Klaveren, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies (AIAS) M.vanKlaveren@uva.nl. You may find further information on the ETUI at www.etui.org, and on the AIAS at www.uva-aias.net. © ETUI aisbl, Brussels 2011.