Public sector workers 'frogmarched' into strike action over pensions

Unions say public sector workers are being forced into further strike action after the details of pension contribution increases were announced. Photograph: Sang Tan/AP

Leaders of teachers, nurses, civil servants, firefighters and other public sector workers claimed they were being "frogmarched" into co-ordinated strike action after the Treasury took the surprise step of setting out in detail how much individuals will have to pay in contributions to their pension schemes from next April.

The overall cost of ?1.2bn is broadly as expected, but senior union sources said "we had no warning of this co-ordinated announcement for each scheme, or that it would be leaked to the Telegraph and the Sun laced with the usual rhetoric about 'gold-plated pensions'."

Union leaders said they were convinced some ministers, including Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude and health secretary Andrew Lansley, remain committed to a negotiated settlement before the new regime is introduced next April, but they questioned whether Treasury ministers were only interested in cash savings.

There was frustration at a recent Liberal Democrat away day for MPs that the party, including Treasury chief secretary Danny Alexander, had found themselves cast in the role of bearer of bad news to the public.

Brian Strutton, national secretary for public services at the GMB union, and one of the negotiators in recent talks, said Alexander had "spiked" the discussions for the second time in two months. "Is the government trying to negotiate or frogmarch us into a dispute?"

He added: "In the past, if somebody had asked me, it was 50/50 whether we solved this through negotiation or not. That balance has now significantly changed and it is 60/40 against us being able to reach a negotiated outcome, which makes the prospect of industrial action in the autumn much more likely."

Alexander said the proposals protected low-paid workers, and ensured a better balance between what taxpayers and workers contributed. Around 750,000 workers should pay nothing extra and another one million should pay no more than 1.5% extra. Talks on specific schemes, such as those in local government and the NHS, will lead to more proposals by the end of October on how further savings of ?2.3bn in 2013/14 and ?2.8bn in 2014/15 can be made.

Under the proposed changes to be introduced next year, nurses and classroom teachers earning ?25,700 will pay an extra ?10 a month for their pension, an NHS consultant on ?130,000 will pay an extra ?152 a month, while civil servants will see their contributions rise by between ?20 and ?140 a month.

Teachers in the most typical pay band – ?32,000 to ?39,999 a year – will see their contributions rise from 6.4% to 7.6%.

"It has nothing to do with the affordability or sustainability of teachers' pensions, it is a tax on teachers to pay for the mistakes of others," said Russell Hobby, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers.

Higher up the income scale, teachers earning ?50,000 would be expected to pay an additional ?696 a year, civil servants ?684 and those working in the NHS would be set for a ?768 hike.

Highest earners would face increases of up to ?284 a month – ?3,400 a year more.

In the ?100,000 bracket, civil servants would pay an extra ?2,100 annually, doctors almost ?2,000 and teachers ?1,752.

In the main firefighter pension scheme members would face rises from 11% to 14%, and to 17% for fire officers. The pension age will also rise to 60. The Fire Brigades Union general secretary Matt Wrack said preliminary arrangements for a strike ballot were being prepared. He said: "This pensions robbery is a crude smash-and-grab raid on firefighter pension rights to help pay for the budget deficit. It is nothing to do with long-term sustainability or affordability."

The greatest savings for the taxpayer will come from the NHS scheme (?530m), followed by the teachers' scheme (?300m) and the civil service (?180m).

Unison leader Dave Prentis accused Alexander of "crude and naive tactics", urging ministers to "stop treating these talks like some kind of playground game".

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: "The unions have absolutely known that this process was going on. The idea that anyone is taken by surprise by this is nonsense."

He said strikes would be "very disappointing" because the government was committed to ensuring that public sector pensions were "among the very best available", adding: "There's still a lot to talk about for the future long-term design of the scheme but there will continue to be, unlike most pension schemes, defined benefit with a guaranteed pension level so no investment risk and they'll be good pensions."

View the original article here

Why I'm calling a pensioners' strike | Brian Schofield

The coalition's war on pensions continues. The latest assault is on the provision for the retirement of public sector employees – who are going to have to pay more to get (probably) less, and later. And not because their pensions funds are financially unsustainable (they're not) but because the pensions on offer just seem too decent, too respectful, in a country where such sentiments are now a luxury. No one else gets a well-managed, reliable employee pension scheme any more, so why should doctors or teachers?

And the war goes wider. There's talk of vicious cuts to the tax relief on private pensions contributions (vigorously denied, for now, but we shall see) and while the plans for the flat weekly state pension of ?140 look enlightened, how long will we have to live before we get the first cheque? Sixty-six (the retirement age in 2020) is just the start of a relentless creep upwards. Frank Field MP, with his depressing willingness to think the unthinkable, has mooted a state retirement age, very soon, of 74.

Can the war be stopped? Not, surely, by the threatened public sector strikes. As a country, we've travelled so far from the idea that a secure retirement is a citizen's right, that no number of angry nurses on Whitehall will shift the argument. Only one group can remind us why we all chip in to pay each other's pensions. Retirees themselves.

I'm calling a pensioners' strike.

"Hang on, but pensioners don't work, do they?" And that's the nub of the problem. Because that pervasive attitude, that retirees don't "work" or "add value", and are a "burden" on the productive population – that idea needs squashing, flat. In an act of solidarity with their juniors – and a demand for a bit of bleedin' respect – Britain's retirees should all, just for one day, do what everyone assumes they do – sit around watching Cash in the Attic, maybe play a spot of golf, have a nap … and do absolutely nothing else. And the country would grind to a standstill.

Let's have the strike in the school holidays, shall we? Because seniors are the largest childcare sector in the UK – providing more hours of care than nurseries, nannies or playgroups, allowing hundreds of thousands of parents to go to work. The value of retirees' grand-childcare is estimated at ?2.6bn a year. On pensioners' strike day, the economy would stall so heavily, George Osborne could use it as an excuse for his next growth figures. Then you have the 1.5 million people over the age of 60 in the UK who currently "work" as carers for ailing spouses, siblings and children. And these days, a significant proportion of retirees are actually still managing, sourcing or providing the care for their own parents.

Finally, a mere 4.9 million people over the age of 65 are currently regularly volunteering or participating in their local civic life. On strike day the country's museums, galleries, stately homes, community bus services, meals on wheels services, literacy programmes, adult education services and so much more would have to be shut down, denied the grey army that keeps them alive. As my grandmother perfectly puts it: "David Cameron goes on about the 'big society' because he doesn't know any old people. We've built it already."

Ironically, old age advocacy charities are desperately trying to promote increased public spending on pensions in developing countries, arguing that pensions are an investment in people at the heart of their families and communities, whose wellbeing thus promotes wider wellbeing. I recently met Lucy Wambui, a 70-year-old raising 10 grandchildren and three great-grandchildren in the slums of Nairobi, and funding all their education through her chip stall and the small pension the charity Help Age International was paying her. Was she a burden on society? Was she hell.

And that's how we should start viewing pensions – not as an outlay, an entry in the national liabilities column, but as an investment in people who haven't stopped making a massive contribution to our lives. And maybe then, after the great grey strike of 2011, we can start a genuinely collaborative conversation about how the generations need to support and depend upon one another, in a humane and caring future.

View the original article here