Response to IBEC’s attack on public service pensions

 Speaking today, TUI General Secretary Peter MacMenamin stated:

“IBEC’s attack on public service pensions is outrageous and nonsensical and only acts as a distraction from the real debate.

It is unacceptable and scandalous that at this time of huge economic turmoil public sector be singled out for harsh punishment in the manner suggested by IBEC.

There is an irony that will no doubt be lost in IBEC that the public service workers they are attacking benefited extremely modestly from our economic boom compared those that their body represents.

Pension provision is currently paid out of Government current expenditure. If we changed towards a system where pension benefit was not defined for new entrants, extra money would have to be set aside from now to build up a pension fund for the distant future. Such policy equates to absolute insanity at a time when we need to curb spending.

Teachers and lecturers were not responsible for the greed and short-sightedness that has put the country’s economy in its current predicament. We will not allow our members to be targeted for the type of extreme avarice that forced Government intervention to bail out our banking system.

If recent months have taught us anything it is that the ordinary people of Ireland should not be forced to pay for the mistakes of the elite that IBEC represents.”