Split up ESB to halt unions’ bully-boy tactics
Yet that is what is being threatened by Brendan Ogle, the secretary of the ESB group of unions.
Most of us had thought the days had gone when a group of workers, singularly focused on their own demands, could bring this country to its knees. That this threat is coming from the most cosseted and highly paid employees in the state makes it all the worse.
The ESB workers’ problem would appear to be the state of their pension funds. They thought, like tens of thousands of others, that their defined benefit scheme was going to continue to keep them in clover after they said farewell to ESB.
However, like the vast bulk of defined benefit schemes there’s an enormous hole in the ESB pension funds. It’s a situation that is mirrored right across the country.
So what exactly is Mr Ogle demanding? Why does he feel that he has to come out with all guns blazing?
He wants the hole plugged. That’s fair enough in as far as it goes. However, he appears to want it plugged yesterday, irrespective of how it’s done, who gets hurt or how it impacts the economy. His view would appear to be that the ESB should stop paying dividends to its shareholder, aka the rest of us, and plunge any profits it makes into the pension black hole.
He assumes workers are the only stakeholders and everyone else is subservient. Mind you, given that one government after another has backed down to ESB union threats, it’s not hard to understand why he thinks they can act with impunity.
It’s a problem that has gone back to the 1970s and before. However, it’s a problem we should not put up with any longer.
The idea of defined pensions is great in theory but impossible in practice. It requires a level of management and market watching, anticipating and providing for, that is beyond most companies and pension trustees as they strive to survive on a day to day basis.
The sense of entitlement that exists in the so-called commercial semi-states is partly attributed to their pseudo public sector positioning. Civil servants, general public sector employees and non-commercial state sector companies have pensions that come by and large from current expenditure. Since there is no fund, government literally makes budget adjustments to cover its current pensions, aka raising taxes. In other words, there’s a permanent hole but we just cannot see it.
When Retail Excellence Ireland suggested that ESB could lose a sizeable number of customers to alternative providers, his remarks were that “it won’t make a blind bit of difference” as ESB Networks was responsible for delivering the power, despite which company had the supply contract.
REI CEO David Fitzsimons went on to say ESB staff “have no understanding of the real world and the harsh economy we live in”.
In essence, Mr Ogle demands that government makes up the shortfall in the ESB pension hole. At the same time his members do not appear to want to have to put any more in the pot.
He is effectively and arrogantly demanding that the private sector shuts up and pays up. If we do not he will make life difficult for us.
Well, we have no more to give. The Government dare not give on our behalf. It does not have a mandate.
We need a level playing field in this country. Rather than try to bring the country to its knees, the ESB group of unions should be looking for ways to resolve this situation as best as it can without using the ‘nuclear’ and bully boy option.
It’s time that the ESB was broken up into different parts and privatised so that no single entity can threaten our economy further.
However, we do need to be sure we do not replace a public sector monopoly with a private sector one.
