When Grandad comes down from the mountain to speak, you better bloody listen. Following an idea by English Mum, Grandad reckons that we bloggers could be doing something useful for the people of Haiti. There has been a lot of writing and twittering about the devastation, the relative culpability of France and the US in reducing Haitians to a below poverty level existence and the complete lack of tact of some cruise line operators.
The rise and impact of social media has enabled stories like this to be instantly shared around the world. While this impact and influence has shown itself in relatively minor episodes, such as the condemnation of Jan Moir’s bitchfest against Stephen Gately there have been few significant examples of social media actually achieving something worthwhile. Well now is the chance for all us bloggers, facebookers, beboists, mySpacers and twitters to take our hands off our keyboards and put them to good use.
Support the organisations like Shelterbox that are bringing life-saving supplies to Haiti. Once you’ve done this tell everyone else you’re connected with to do the same. Lets see what a global network can really achieve. Yesterday was Martin Luther King Day in the US, the epitome of inclusiveness, justice and action. Don’t let his ideals down.
One story that the Government tried to bury on Christmas Eve eve looks like growing legs. The decision to reverse the pay cut given to top civil servants is up there with John Bonham having one more for the road. The idea that these well paid servants of the people had been hard done by in having their bonuses removed last year is laughable.
For a start, I don’t recall any of these mandarins not receiving a bonus, certainly all the top management in my Department always got their bonuses regardless of output of their various Divisions. As well as that, the bonus was supposed to be performance related but I don’t recall any criteria being applied by which performance could be measured. I’m sure there is a Department of Finance circular detailing the criteria but life is too short to be reading their bullshit.
The mainstream media is slowly turning its attention to the story. Scary Carey in the Times had an unusually well-written piece that actually addressed the issue and managed not to mention any of her auctioneer/county council family members – a first for her, I think.She hits the nail on the head when she says that this is all to do with saving the pension arrangements of the top rank in our public service. And who could bet against the Government reversing their own pay cuts when the Dail finally gets round to reforming politicians expenses?
What the reversal actually boils down to is that the top management of civil servants will take a pay cut of about 4 per cent. That is almost half of what I am being hit with (6.5% from this week). Yet, I will be expected to do more work this year due to the amount of people who have retired in the past four months (my Department will lose 20% of its staff) while our top management will not have any extra burden on their shoulders.
There isn’t much public support for civil or public servants at the moment but over the next few months we are going to witness a considerable reduction in the level of service delivery from the public sector. This will not be our fault but you can be sure that Cowen and Co will spin it, with the cooperation of most of the media, that we are the ones to blame, yet again. It’s just a shame that we aren’t more militant in this country, otherwise that shower of inept wankers in the Dail would be cowering like dust mites in front of a Dyson.
