IMPACT welcomed the budget day announcement that there are to be no further reductions to public service numbers. The union has also welcomed news that new posts are to be created for special needs assistants (SNAs), community and mental health staff and in the civil service, marking the end of a lengthy moratorium which has seen remaining staff throughout the public sector put under enormous pressure to maintain services.

IMPACT general secretary Shay Cody said, “The news that public service numbers face no further cuts is welcome. That there is to be recruitment in some areas will be especially welcome news to hard pressed staff who have faced the challenge of increased demands on the services they work in.

“This has built up every year since the moratorium was applied and as numbers continued to fall. The announcement of new posts today marks an end to that phase, and hopefully the beginning of a new phase of recruitment which will be vital to the sustainability of services across the public sector” he said.

The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Brendan Howlin TD, also announced new teaching posts, including resource education posts, and this week announced that over 550 entry and graduate level jobs are to be filled in the public sector. These include 300 clerical officer jobs and at least 250 graduate positions.

IMPACT’s deputy general secretary Kevin Callinan said that while the announcement of an additional 365 SNA posts in last week’s budget was welcome, he hoped that the increase in numbers would help guard against a growing trend for the fragmentation of existing posts, with many SNAs losing out as their posts are reduced down to just a few hours a week. “The creation of these additional posts, alongside increases in the number of teachers, is good news for children entering education next year, and will be welcome news to their parents.

“While these new posts are a great addition to the service, individual SNAs have really suffered in the last couple of years as their posts are broken down into, in some cases, just a few hours a week. That’s not a good development for children who rely on the service, and it has made it impossible for many SNAs to make any kind of living from their work. I hope that the additional posts announced today can contribute to reversing this type of harmful work pattern” he said.

Restoration and income recovery

In a letter to the secretary general of the Department of Education and Skills, Mr Seán Ó Foghlú, Kevin said that the union had been reviewing SNA allocations since the commencement of the current school year, and was alarmed at the scale of the fragmentation of posts.

He said that in some cases SNAs had their hours and incomes cut. “It flies completely in the face of the principles underlying the Croke Park and Haddington Road agreements that individual public servants would suffer a loss of income as a result of the administrative practices being operated” he said.

Kevin added that the union regards the department as being in breach of public service agreements, and sought assurances that steps would be taken to restore working hours and income to members.

IMPACT has welcomed the additional resources allocated to homeless services and social housing investment announced in the budget. The union has campaigned throughout 2014 to protect homeless services budgets, and has called for investment in social housing, for Government intervention in the housing market and for emergency rent controls.

IMPACT’s Boards & Voluntary agencies branch represents workers in homeless services.

Deputy general secretary Kevin Callinan said “These additional resources will help those service organisations and local authorities to continue to deliver vital services as the homeless crisis continues to hold so many vulnerable people in its grip. The additional investment into social housing is essential now in order to get more people into housing, and we hope to see the pressure on homeless services eventually reduced as a result.”

IMPACT organiser Joe O’Connor said the union would continue to campaign in partnership with homeless advocacy groups in order to maintain pressure at local and national government level. “There has been an acknowledgement from the political system that this crisis is real and demands immediate action and we welcome that. It is vital that we maintain a strong focus on this issue, as we continue to seek to resolve the long term issues at the root of the homeless crisis” he said.

"If rent control is off the agenda, the rental market’s dysfunction is doomed to continue" - blog by Joe'O Connor

The Labour Court has found that the HSE West was wrong not to consult with staff before it shut down 22 acute in-patient beds in Ballinasloe’s psychiatric unit in 2012. The ruling, issued this week, found that management’s decision to go ahead with the closure was in breach of a consultation agreement with unions, and instructed management that it must comply with these agreements in the future.

The case was brought to the Labour Court by IMPACT, along with Siptu and the PNA. IMPACT assistant general secretary, Padraig Mulligan, said there has been deep and widespread anger about the closure and the way it was handled by HSE management, with staff only learning of the decision through the media.

Padraig explained “The first that unions and staff knew of this plan was when it was announced on national and local radio.  Having announced this significant change the manager then went on holidays, leaving nobody to communicate why the decision had been made or what was going to happen to staff. It was handled in a really slipshod manner.”

Padraig said that management had previously made commitments to staff about the retention of the acute beds in the unit. “Staff faced immediate uncertainty and redeployment despite the commitments to them and to the community served by the unit. This was at a time of significant wage cuts and the costs of putting new arrangements in place for transport and childcare put a number of staff in an immediately difficult financial position” he said.

Padraig welcomed the Labour Court’s finding and said that it had vindicated the position of the staff and unions involved.

The Irish Congress of Trade Union’s (Ictu) Youth Connect programme, which runs education and information programmes in schools, has launched this year’s Youth for Decent Work Awards, and are inviting entries for this year’s video competition from second level students.

An ideal project for transition year students (if you have any at home) the challenge is to create a three minute video about income inequality and how 'Decent Work' can address it.

The winning team (of two to four people) and their classmates will be invited to an Oscar-style Youth for Decent Work Award ceremony in February, and will also be in with a chance to win a five day team trip to New York with their teacher.

The competition provides an opportunity for young people to highlight their interpretation of the theme and what it means to them. All of the participating teams are invited to attend the award ceremony in Dublin, with fantastic educational prizes up for grabs for best acting, best interpretation, most original/creative entry and a ‘People’s Choice’ award.

Assistant general secretary of Ictu Sally Ann Kinahan said “This is a great opportunity for students to explore an important topic and develop important skills in media and digital literacy, team work, research, and critical thinking.

“This year we have developed greater resource material for teachers and students to help them with this project including a free workshop on inequality, a teaching resource module and instructional videos filled with tips on brainstorming, storyboarding, script writing, rehearsals, filming and editing. I’m very much looking forward to this year’s entries following the high level of creativity and innovation demonstrated by last year’s contestants” she said.

Full details, terms & conditions, how to access resource material and an online registration form are available here.

Download the competition poster HERE.

The Labour Court has ruled that it could find no merit in a decision, made by management in the HSE South in 2012, to enforce a unilateral withdrawal of consolidated leave entitlements for staff.

The dispute originated in the decision to withdraw leave that had, prior to 2006, been granted to IMPACT members in HSE Kerry who worked in locations where race meetings or festivals took place. In 2006 IMPACT Kerry Branch entered into an agreement with the HSE South to abolish these concession days, and an additional 1.5 days annual leave was granted in lieu on a personal to holder basis. Staff who joined the HSE South Kerry after 2006 did not have an entitlement to the additional annual leave days.  In 2010 the agreement was applied to physiotherapist members.

IMPACT assistant general secretary, Marie Levis, explained “In 2012 the HSE South removed these additional annual leave days from members and applied compensation of 1.5 times the annual loss as a once-off concession.  The HSE South claimed the standardisation of annual leave arrangements in the public health sector in 2012 allowed it to remove these days, and apply a once-off compensation, as local leave arrangements such as festival days and race days were to be abolished.

“IMPACT advised that no such concession days had existed following the collective agreement in 2006 which had abolished them. The HSE refused to reinstate the annual leave days. At the Labour Court, we argued that management’s actions amounted to a breach of the collective agreement which had been entered into in good faith in 2006” she said.

The dispute was heard by the Labour Court in September and the Court  found that the HSE had abolished the additional leave associated with festival and race days for all new employees and had converted it into annual leave for staff in employment in the affected grades in 2006 and in 2010. 

The Court stated management were now seeking to reverse that decision and to treat that annual leave as” festival or race day” leave.  The Court stated that while the relevant leave for the affected staff may have had its origin in festival or race day leave, it was converted into annual leave in 2006 and 2010 respectively and that decision cannot be undone.

Marie said that IMPACT has written to the employer, seeking confirmation that it will implement the decision of the Court, and reinstate the annual leave to affected members.

An estimated 1,500 people took part in the ICTU rally in the centre of Belfast last Saturday (18^th October).  Similar rallies took place in London and Glasgow, where tens of thousands took to the streets.  The rally brought together the campaign by the NI committee of Congress, A pay rise for all, with the TUC’s Britain needs a pay rise campaign. Both campaigns have called for pay rises for workers whose real-term incomes have fallen by an average of €63.00 a week since 2008.  

Peter Bunting, Ictu assistant general secretary in Belfast said “Getting money back into the pockets of working people is the key to any genuine recovery – and that is true of all economies across Europe. Northern Ireland has the highest number of low paid workers of any UK region. Almost a quarter of NI workers earn below the living wage, and that number is increasing. 

“Pay rises are the only sure way we can kickstart growth and get people back to work. That is why unions in Northern Ireland joined with the TUC in organising a series of major demonstrations. We need to raise wages, which have not kept pace with prices since the 1970s, in most countries. Falling wages feed inequality, poverty and social division. We need a pay rise for all” he said.

TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said the high turnout sent a strong message to the government that wages need to rise.“Our message is that after the longest and deepest pay squeeze in recorded history, it’s time to end the lock-out that has kept the vast majority from sharing in the economic recovery”.  Protesters in Belfast called for an enforced minimum wage and commitments to a living wage for everyone, as well as a crackdown on excessive executive pay and bonuses and on tax evasion and avoidance. 

IMPACT general secretary, Shay Cody, told delegates at the union’s biennial delegate conference in May that virtually everyone was worse off now than they were a few years ago, “but it has happened in different ways depending on where you work and what your personal circumstances are.” He said that unions were now “moving from the necessary and difficult defensive position of the last half-decade to a strategy of income recovery.”

IMPACT has written to all branches about an issue of concern to work sharers, and other staff on part time hours, about their social insurance contributions (PRSI).

The rules governing PRSI contributions require a person, for whom a contribution is made, to work for at least one day in a PRSI contribution week.

If a person does not work at least one day within a contribution week, it is not possible for a PRSI contribution to be made in respect of that week. As an individual’s work attendance pattern may affect a person’s social welfare contribution record (i.e. not all attendance patterns may reckon as 52 contributions in any or every year), it is important that members are aware that their attendance pattern may affect their social welfare entitlements.

Under existing legislation, a contribution week for PRSI purposes commences at the start of the tax year on whatever day the 1st January falls. In 2015 this will start on Thursday 1st January.

As a consequence, each PRSI contribution week will run from Thursday to Wednesday for 2015. To qualify for a PRSI contribution a person must work at least one day in a PRSI contribution week. This means that any person in a work sharing arrangement  who works week on/week off -  on the basis of a Thursday to Wednesday work pattern  - will only be awarded 26 contributions for 2015 (instead of a possible 52).

If members are working this or any other similar attendance pattern, they would put at risk their social welfare entitlements in 2015, unless they change to a pattern which would qualify for 52 contributions.

The Irish Government has been urged to change the law in order to make it a criminal offence to purchase sex, following a change of the law this week in Northern Ireland. The ban on the purchase of sex is an approach that was first adopted successfully in Sweden, and Irish campaigners have been campaigning to make similar changes to the law here.

The Immigrant Council of Ireland (ICI) welcomed the majority vote at the Northern Ireland Assembly, making the purchase of sex illegal. Denise Charlton, Chief Executive of the ICI said that the law change now creates urgency for the Irish Government to follow suit, as traffickers and pimps are likely to increase their business activities in the Republic.

Ms Charlton said “It’s time for TDs and the Government to end the delay in introducing similar laws here in order to prevent that happening. Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald, TD has already spoken of targeting demand in order to smash the business model for pimps and traffickers” she said.

Research published by Queen’s University in Belfast found that about 17,500 people pay for sex in Northern Ireland every year.

IMPACT, together with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and other organisations, has supported the Turn Off the Red Light campaign to end prostitution and sex trafficking in Ireland.