national strike

[kalinski]

Cue many pages of people arguing thereby distracting from the fact that both public and private sector workers have been shafted plenty over the years and will continue to be shafted. Unless you are a High Net Worth Individual in which case changes to pensions in 2005 took a couple of billion extra out the tax pot and into your pensions. Divide and conquer - oldest trick in the book.

well said. Please don't forget that public sector pay tax and work hard for their pay. Give me a nurse or teacher in terms of being worthwhile job, over a city boy pissing all our futures up the wall

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

700,000 public section workers are going to lose their jobs, many already have, but yet not a word how this effects the deficit in public sector pensions. At the end of the day they have to be paid, those in the private sector will still have to pay for them through their taxes.

more cuts....and yet more and more benefit payments. No wonder the deficit will not be cut by the end of this parliament. Gideon's Plan A is failing on its own merits.

March of The Makers, where's the f***ing investment?

 

[kemptown kid]

I'm a public sector worker, a teacher, and will be on strike tomorrow and, I expect, again in the months to come. Our pension is a part of the pay and conditions we signed up to, not a charitable extra. If I work, paying my pension contributions and taxes, for forty years I will receive 50% of my £40,000 salary - by what distorted standards is this 'gold plated' luxury?
Incidentally, two years of a pay freeze followed by the proposed 1% cap for two years would result in an effective 20% pay cut at current rates of inflation. I'll leave the old Etonians to explain how cutting our spending power by a fifth is going to help the economic recovery.
The failure of many private employers to provide their workers with a living pension at the end of a life of work is no reason for provision for state employees to be similarly shameful and inadequate and will, incidentally, result in millions being forced to work when they are not fit and to depend on benefits in their old age - thus all us tax payers, whoever we work/worked for, will be subsidising inadequate pension provision.
Don't fall for the divide and rule nonsense - what family doesn't include a nurse, teacher, council worker etc? What private company doesn't rely on public sector contracts and/or public sector workers buying their goods and services?

 

[Tony Towner's Fridge]

Shame on the lot of em.

Ageing population. Excessive pensions, no money to pay for them. What do you expect?

Get back to work and put some elbow grease into your work for once you public service slackers.

Country in financial meltdown, legacy from the last lot of money spending wasters.

Only way out of it is work, work , work. Not strike, strike, strike.

No excuses.

TNBA

TTF

 

[Adam_Banana20]

I saw on meridian that some of them we're striking because they didn't want to work over 60 years of age!!

 

[beorhthelm]

If I work, paying my pension contributions and taxes, for forty years I will receive 50% of my £40,000 salary - by what distorted standards is this 'gold plated' luxury?

by the standards of the 23million+ workers who dont get a anywhere near that, as illustrated before. to recap, unless your are paying in about £750pm, 20% of your salary, its a blinding nice deal. lets say silver plated, since the gold plated usually refers to the senior managment packages. But reallly its not about the private pension equivalents, they are just there to illustrate why you will find little sympathy. its the fact that the current pensions are unsustainable because going forward you will have more people in pensions than paying for them.

Incidentally, two years of a pay freeze followed by the proposed 1% cap for two years would result in an effective 20% pay cut at current rates of inflation.

I hope you dont work with budgets.

 

[The Auctioneer]

Oh Dear...did not want to do this.
Manager £17,000pa....Pension Zero....Too old to change....Rented Accomodation....STRIKE? Out of Job, still no pension, no accomodation. Give me a managerial job in the public sector PLEASE!

 

[Skaville]

My two penneth. I'm a private sector worker and fully behind all of you public sector workers striking tomorrow. Good on you, fight the power and good luck (unfortunately, you're f***ed but I'm wishing you good luck anyway).

 

[m20gull]

I remember the right-wingers in my life banging on about Blair and Brown raiding their pensions, and I was sympathetic to them at the time, rather annoyed that they now have the opposite opinion about public-sector pensions.

That's two entirely different things.
The first was a stealth tax on private funded pension schemes - all of them. Making private pensions more expensive was bound to cause employers to consider how they might better spend their money - unsurprisingly many of them (thought not all) too a look at the risks they were facing and ran away. Why support a benefit that the government can make, at a stroke, more expensive?
The problem being currently fought over by the public sector is nothing to do with that, because most of them are not funded. However the same problem is faced by private schemes too: we are generally living longer. Regardless of the mechanism being used, pensions are about wealth transfer from one generation to another - in the unfunded public sector current pensioners are paid by current taxpayers. Future pensions will be paid for by future taxpayers - with more pensioners living longer, future taxpayers will end up paying more for schemes of the current design. That tax revenue will not be available for other uses, such as paying doctors and nurses. So the proposal is for changes to the schemes so that they pay less pension for the same amount of time, or the same pension for a shorter period of time.
This is not to do with the deficit, it's not a battle of right v. left (see the Hutton report), it's simple:
If you want to benefit from medical advances and live longer, ask yourself who pays for it - you or someone else?

 

[Skaville]

PS - I'm in a commission based role in the private sector and paid a massive amount of tax this month but I always brush this off knowing that much of the money is going towards the people in the private sector like teachers and nurses who have the guts and pure dedication to do the kind of work I know I would never have the courage, dedication or backbone to do. I never understand why so many tossers in the private sector begrudge and under value what you do and I for one salute you.

 

[paddy]

I agree but the point I am obtusely making is that we accept their pensions are part of their pay and conditions. The point about public sector wages is that they are generally lower and have reasonable pensions. The reasonable pensions are an alternative to paying more now and as an alternative to issuing bonds or PFI initiatives could be seen as very efficient.

This is simply untrue. The average public sector wage is £3,800 higher than the average private sector wage.

Edit: I should say that I don't mean to say that this is wrong, just that your argument is.

 

[Deleted member 22389]

I'm a public sector worker, a teacher, and will be on strike tomorrow and, I expect, again in the months to come. Our pension is a part of the pay and conditions we signed up to, not a charitable extra. If I work, paying my pension contributions and taxes, for forty years I will receive 50% of my £40,000 salary - by what distorted standards is this 'gold plated' luxury?
Incidentally, two years of a pay freeze followed by the proposed 1% cap for two years would result in an effective 20% pay cut at current rates of inflation. I'll leave the old Etonians to explain how cutting our spending power by a fifth is going to help the economic recovery.
The failure of many private employers to provide their workers with a living pension at the end of a life of work is no reason for provision for state employees to be similarly shameful and inadequate and will, incidentally, result in millions being forced to work when they are not fit and to depend on benefits in their old age - thus all us tax payers, whoever we work/worked for, will be subsidising inadequate pension provision.
Don't fall for the divide and rule nonsense - what family doesn't include a nurse, teacher, council worker etc? What private company doesn't rely on public sector contracts and/or public sector workers buying their goods and services?

My wife is a teacher and I fully support everything you are doing. Its about time people woke up and stopped listening to the rubbish that is coming out of these politicians mouths.

My wife has had parents in today, and they all fully support the actions of the teachers. The reason why they support this, is they appreciate how hard and devoted the teachers are at her school.
The school has been turned around.

 

[drew]

Oh Dear...did not want to do this.
Manager £17,000pa....Pension Zero....Too old to change....Rented Accomodation....STRIKE? Out of Job, still no pension, no accomodation. Give me a managerial job in the public sector PLEASE!

A manager on £17k, what sector of industry is that in then? Also, by manager, do you mean a manager responsible for a team, the budget for the department, recruitment of staff etc etc or someone who is more accurately described as a section head?

That's two entirely different things.
The first was a stealth tax on private funded pension schemes - all of them. Making private pensions more expensive was bound to cause employers to consider how they might better spend their money - unsurprisingly many of them (thought not all) too a look at the risks they were facing and ran away. Why support a benefit that the government can make, at a stroke, more expensive?
The problem being currently fought over by the public sector is nothing to do with that, because most of them are not funded. However the same problem is faced by private schemes too: we are generally living longer. Regardless of the mechanism being used, pensions are about wealth transfer from one generation to another - in the unfunded public sector current pensioners are paid by current taxpayers. Future pensions will be paid for by future taxpayers - with more pensioners living longer, future taxpayers will end up paying more for schemes of the current design. That tax revenue will not be available for other uses, such as paying doctors and nurses. So the proposal is for changes to the schemes so that they pay less pension for the same amount of time, or the same pension for a shorter period of time.
This is not to do with the deficit, it's not a battle of right v. left (see the Hutton report), it's simple:
If you want to benefit from medical advances and live longer, ask yourself who pays for it - you or someone else?

Banging on about longevity and funding but you don't make any comment on the fact that both the teachers and nhs staff had their pension schemes (probably the two biggest in the public sector) reviewed and changed only about 3/4 years ago. Are you suggesting that the actuarial evidence that brought about those changes has significantly changed in that short time and that all of a sudden, ie within the last 4 years, it has been decided that people are living 10/15 year longer.

The public sector is probably the only sector with strong union representation, after all, the last tory regime decimated all the manufacturing sectors with strong union support. Defeat the unions then defeat labour once and for all.

All this reference to the deficit is also a red herring because savings won't be made until at least 10 years down the road so no effect on the current austerity measures.

 

[jackanada]

This is simply untrue. The average public sector wage is £3,800 higher than the average private sector wage.

Edit: I should say that I don't mean to say that this is wrong, just that your argument is.

The figure you are quoting is the median wage of all full time employees. Read the link I posted after this for an explanation why this figure is meaningless. Yes my second sentence does not stand scrutiny so disregard, but likewise your rebuttal holds no water.

 

[m20gull]

Banging on about longevity and funding but you don't make any comment on the fact that both the teachers and nhs staff had their pension schemes (probably the two biggest in the public sector) reviewed and changed only about 3/4 years ago. Are you suggesting that the actuarial evidence that brought about those changes has significantly changed in that short time and that all of a sudden, ie within the last 4 years, it has been decided that people are living 10/15 year longer.

.

But those changes were basically for new entrants. Existing employees had some minor changes and, for some, a small increase in contributions but they can still retire at 60. Existing employees are just as likely to benefit from the increased longevity.

 

[drew]

But those changes were basically for new entrants. Existing employees had some minor changes and, for some, a small increase in contributions but they can still retire at 60. Existing employees are just as likely to benefit from the increased longevity.

With the NHS one they were not minor changes. If you had been in the old scheme for some time then yes, there were no benefits to changing, but with more recent staff who joined the old scheme, there were much better benefits for switching to the new scheme, as although it meant working longer the actual pension was a better.

Going back to the arguments relating to the funding, people seem to be up in arms that the government, or in effect the tax payer, should contribute to the public sector pensions yet in the private sector, all companies I ever worked for and many others that I know all contribute to their employees pension pot. So why should it be any different for the public sector? If you work in the private sector and your employer just decided they were not going pay that contribution you would be up in arms and say that it was a breach of the terms of your contract and that whilst it was paid by the employer, it still formed part of your salary package. Well same for the public sector only the contributions don't go into a pension pot, they go into the treasury to spend on anything they see fit.

 

[ferring seagull]

Sad to see that so many are so detached from reality

 

[m20gull]

It's true that many private companies contribute to an employee's pension scheme but according to the BBC only 3.2m out of 23m private sector workers have access to a scheme at present.

It would be unusual for contributions or benefits to be included in the contract of employment. Normally the contract would only specify that the employer will make a pension scheme available. That way the company can change terms for future service. Until recently the company could basically change any terms it liked for future service but now it has to "consult" first before doing so.

Benefits and contributions already built up are protected, just like they are going to be for public sector workers.

 

[Max Paper]

All I know is that my daughters teacher is striking so my wife has to take the day off work to look after her, which means she has to make up the time on Saturday which means I cant go to the Forest game because I have to look after the kids. If I took the day off in protest that I don't have a pension or that my overtime has been cut to time and that I've had no pay rise in 4 years I would be sacked.

 

[W.C.]

PS - I'm in a commission based role in the private sector and paid a massive amount of tax this month but I always brush this off knowing that much of the money is going towards the people in the private sector like teachers and nurses who have the guts and pure dedication to do the kind of work I know I would never have the courage, dedication or backbone to do. I never understand why so many tossers in the private sector begrudge and under value what you do and I for one salute you.

Agree.