Pensions - divide and rule
WORKERS, NOV 2005 ISSUE
Public sector workers in health, teaching and the civil service will be breathing a sigh of relief, quite prematurely, that they are out of the immediate firing line over pensions following an agreement reached by the trade unions and government on 18 October 2005. The agreement promises lifelong protection for existing pension scheme members. It will open up the schemes for specific negotiations which may or may not improve matters. And it will generate a two-tier pension scheme for new entrants, who can only catch up if they pay more contributions and work longer but will probably exacerbate the non-participation in pension schemes by new young low-paid workers.
The splintering off of health, education and civil service workers will isolate all workers in the Local Government Pension Scheme. But 20% of the scheme's membership do not work in local government: police civilians, further education non-teaching staff, Environmental Agency staff, transport staff, certain privatised utility staff, probation and Criminal Justice System staff, etc. So there will be divide and rule.
There will be a further divide and rule of workers in comparable schemes but not covered by this first tranche of change, for example, police, fire brigades, universities and so on.
Posturing
All the posturing, huffing and puffing from certain trade union figures at all levels, whether lay officials or general secretaries, large trade unions or smaller ones, looks rather beached. The government did a body swerve in March when it announced the shelving of its original proposals, so as to duck confrontation prior to the General Election. Was it intimidated by the threat of industrial action? The largest local government union, Unison, could barely deliver 23% of its local government membership for industrial action. Other unions, such as the TGWU, didn't even ballot, they just blinked.
And what of the supposed radical leadership of the civil service trade union, the PCS? They have accepted the protectionist deal for what now emerges as three differing three-tier pension schemes in the civil service. So a second body swerve has kept the initiative with the government and left the trade unions once more on the defensive laggards' path.
All the trade unions have looked to a protectionist position, with those in the schemes seeking to protect their own interests and leaving the next generation to find its own way. Cleverly interwoven with protectionism is the argument of advancing equalities, addressing potential age and sex discrimination and recognising that the profile of workers in the public sector has changed – 72% of the workforce in local government are women who will have career breaks, for example.
The unions' list of changes in society (demography, workforce gender, working patterns, healthier workers, flexibility, choice) is in government language and is longer than the government's own list.
Everyone is joyous that confrontation has been avoided, except of course, local government workers. The cabinet have endorsed a deal which highlights consultation, partnership, fairness, no detriment etc. – all the buzzwords of the 21st century. But not for local government workers, or for younger workers yet to enter the professions. their interests have been sold by the unions.
The presumption of this government that they can commit to a 50-year deal borders on laughable. The new deal is underwritten by the Treasury, hence Brown is as much to blame as Blair, Prescott and Johnson. Over the next 50 years the proportion of GDP to be spent on pensions will rise from 1.5% to 2.2%. Except for local government staffs. Their pension scheme is to be savaged; retirement ages will be increased, etc.
So what becomes of the 1.3 million local government employees? Obviously the fight will be for parity with health, teachers and civil servants. No longer one of defend what exists with a view to improvement, but the better of two evils. If the 50-year deal doesn't raise a laugh, then the logic proffered by Britain's largest union, Unison, surely will: that this is a Tory plot to attack workers' rights to their deferred wages – their pensions – by the Tory-led Local Government Association. Unless you recognise that as ritual Labour Party disinformation?