At its recent conference the ASTI passed a motion of support for the nurse’s campaign of industrial action. Given the ASTI record of misjudging the public mood it should give the Nurse’s pause for thought. Looking for shorter hours and higher pay is not the way to win public support and there has been little evidence of the public having any sympathy for the Nurse’s arguments.
The Nurse’s timing could hardly have been worse; their industrial action has coincided with the release by the CSO of inflation figures which clearly show that inflation in Ireland is on the rise and that the public sector is a major contributing factor. In addition there have been a number of high profile announcements of significant job losses which have undermined consumer confidence and made people fearful of losing their own jobs.
Inflation is not news to the business community, which has been screaming about Ireland’s cost base for the last two years, but it is news to Irish voters. Dan Boyle the Green Party spokesperson was right to point out that inflation could well become an election issue and that as public sector inflation was running at twice the headline rate Government could well pay a political price.
For the last few years Irish consumers have been remarkably sanguine about inflation Rip Off Ireland was an issue but only in the Autumn. (When the happy holidaymaker returned home, back to Irish restaurant dinner bills, that could support a family of four in Greece or Budapest for a week). However now rising interest rates are squeezing family budgets and ESB or Gas Bills are producing unwelcome shocks on a regular basis. Inflation is indeed an issue and for the first time the public (encouraged by the opposition) are beginning to join the dots together and connect benchmarking and inflation. If you are a public servant now not the time to be arguing you need more money for doing less.
The Government is also in a bind, the kind of action needed to curb public sector inflation could easy anger very powerful vested interests. Not something you want to do in an election year. The Taoiseach has asked the OECD to report on Irish
Public sector reform, the report (not unsurprisingly) is due well after the election.
For the opposition, inflation is an ideal club with which to beat the Government, however don’t expect too much talk of public sector reform. There are in excess of 350,000 public servants in Ireland in approximately 574 Departments and Agencies. That’s a lot of voters. Public Sector Reform is probably the single most important issue facing the Irish economy and indeed Irish society. Almost all of the challenges we face have a public sector element to them. However, it not an issue that attracts votes. When voters see failing public services they automatically think more needs to be spent on them rather than they need reform. The benefits of reform can seem nebulous to the general public but the Public Sector Unions the pain of reform can seem all too real. Paradoxically some of the best thinking about reform is not in the political parties but in the permanent Government. As one civil servant said to me ten percent of the service desperately want reform, 10 percent will oppose reform any cost and the remaining 80 percent are there to be won over. I can’t see any politician trying to do that anytime soon.
To take one concrete example, the Teacher Unions make a great deal of the Pupil Teacher Ratio being the key to improving education. However, quietly education experts will tell you, that it is the quality of the teaching which is the key to improving educational performance. Somehow I can’t see any education Minister or potential education Minister making that argument in public.
No party wants to pick a fight with the Public Sector Unions. However if a Public Sector Union picks the fight, that’s a different story. Unwittingly the Nurse’s may have thrown a political lifeline to Health Minister Mary Harney. By engaging in industrial action the Nurses have changed the focus of debate on Health. Up to now the media story has been that reform is not working and the health service is a shambles. Now the story has become the unreasonable behaviour of the Nurses. The Minister now has a ready excuse as to why reform is taking so long; look at the kind of unreasonable demands she has to deal with. When the ASTI publicly backs you, you have a problem.
Seamus Mulconry is director of Public Affairs in Edelman Dublin
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