Hitting part-time home helps is not the answer

I FIND it extraordinary that the Government thinks cutting the pay of some of the lowest paid workers somehow will help get us out of the recession. Take, for example, home helps earning €11 to €12 an hour providing essential care in the community — most of them working part-time only. Take away 6% of their pay and all the Government will do is add to the dole queues.

There is no doubt reforms and cuts are needed in the public service, and there are plenty of high earners to choose from. However, taking 6% from those who shower, dress, wash and feed our vulnerable and elderly people surely can’t be the fair answer.

I would like to see cabinet members working for €12 an hour giving the showers, lifting the patients and all for four weeks’ holidays — not five months’ leave and €191,000 a year for possibly a three-day week with all expenses included. A fair plan, is it?