Union leader defends public service

A senior trade union leader has launched a broadside at a number of independent TDs who he claims are "scapegoating the public service for political advantage".

Public Service Executive Union (PSEU) general secretary Tom Geraghty referred to a recent survey which found half of respondents said they would pay more tax in return for good public services.

“This is a useful antidote to the two mantras so well aired in the media for lower taxes all round or for somebody else to pay — the latter being the most common response to suggestions of a need to raise revenue,” Mr Geraghty said in a blog on his union’s website.

“The frequent sub-clause of the ‘somebody else should pay’ sentiment is that the ‘somebodies’ who should pay are seen to be those who work to provide public services i.e. the people that this union represents and their fellow public servants.”

The PSEU leader said that approach was rapidly turning into a political art form.

He then named a number of independent TDs who, he said see the public service as a “convenient repository” for unfounded criticism.

“The latest expression of this dangerous populism can be found in the utterances of the newly-elected deputy for Roscommon/South Leitrim, Michael Fitzmaurice, who wishes to found a new political party, the only clear policy of which seems to be to do damage to the civil service as we know it. Sadly, this means that he joins a lengthening queue.”

He said that Mattie McGrath had weighed in to pledge his allegiance to “such sentiments”.

“Equally, Deputy Lucinda Creighton’s agonising about whether or not to form a new party apparently rests on whether she can persuade enough people of the need for such a party because, among other things, she is of the belief that the civil service needs to be sorted out.”

Mr Geraghty said the country was witnessing nothing less than the scapegoating of the public service for political advantage.

Mr Fitzmaurice said that he had always said that ordinary civil servants do a fine job and he had no problem with them.

“He said that he had an issue with “the permanent government” — senior civil servants. He said that there was a need for an intake of young people with fresh ideas.

Lucinda Creighton and Mattie McGrath were unavailable for comment yesterday.