Facing the crisis - Budget will fail unless it is equitable

IT IS not an exaggeration to say that the section of today’s cabinet meeting dedicated to preparing next month’s budget will be just a small step in a process more challenging than anything faced by any Irish politician in the past half a century.

That budget must try to create an environment to foster confidence based on new realities; confidence based on a plausible plan to confront excess and a near-fatal dependence on the building sector.

It must, despite being set against a frightening international economic background, try to build confidence by being firm, impartial, equitable and by taking decisions that represent the best interests of the country rather than those of Taoiseach Cowen and Finance Minister Lenihan’s party. They must focus on how our economy might develop over the next decade rather than on the 2009 local and European elections.

If we expect Mr Cowen and Mr Lenihan to put party interests aside then everyone involved in the social partnership process must do the same. Everyone must look beyond their sectional interests and be sure they have a full understanding of the consequences of a budget that will do little more than stick a finger in a dyke. Only those representing the lower paid can hope for anything other than the toughest love.

Sadly, the sense of social unity needed to achieve these objectives was undermined again at the weekend when details of payments above salaries made to public servants were released. Health Service Executive staff received almost €712m in extra payments — more or less €2 million each and every day.

The comptroller and auditor general also tells us that 33,866 HSE staff shared overtime payments of €220m; 48,511 staff got €124m in “allowances” and 61,465 received €193m above their salary as “weekend” payments. One HSE employee earned €140,986 on top of their salary. Another was paid €170,426 extra in “on-call” payments; one received €153,481 on top of their wage packet in “allowances” and yet another got an extra €124,629 in “other” remuneration.

These figures are an affront to anyone who believes we live in an equitable society and strike at the very heart of the great dilemma strangling our health service.

They also confirm that we have become a two-tier society because any private sector manager who would be delusional enough to approve this level of payment above salaries would have his P45 before lunchtime.

Already, an outline of what can be expected has been leaked, though it would be foolish to draw swords before the October 14 budget day confirms the severity and the focus of the measures. However, one of the suggestions is that up to 1,000 redundancies among administrative staff in the HSE will be announced by Mr Lenihan. He may also signal his intent to proceed with a public-service-wide scheme in 2009, but awaits findings of a taskforce on public sector reform next month before detailed work on the scale, cost and target areas can begin. Effectively, undoing the silliness indulged in by Bertie Ahern when he abolishing the health boards but did not abolish superfluous jobs.

Another bank was nationalised in Britain yesterday and it seems as if America’s $700 billion rescue package will be approved. These events have led to a widespread acceptance that we face great difficulties but unless the medicine is administered with an even hand then justified discontent will fester and make the prospect of recovery even more remote.