“I’m a nurse. I’d briefly like the chance to explain why pay restoration is so vital for us. It’s not a pay increase that we are looking for and in my opinion deserve. We are just simply looking to have our pay restored.
I like thousands of others went to college for four years and got my nursing degree. I finally had the career I dreamed of.
I got married to a tradesman. We got a mortgage for a three bedroomed house and we had two children.
We could pay for our mortgage. We had one family holiday a year. We had two cars. Neither of us had new cars but the cars we bought got us to our jobs and back home again.
We lived a normal life. Nothing fancy. But we got by.
Then the banks and the government decided to gamble with our lives.
My husband lost his job in the crash.
And I was forced to take on all the bills including the mortgage.
It was tough but I did ok for the first few months. We sold my husbands car for €3000. We tightened our belts.
Then the government decided to punish us even further for their mistakes. They introduced USC. Again we tightened our belts even further. My husband was getting the odd job here and there but his weekly wage was gone. We were struggling to get by.
Gone was the yearly holiday. Gone were the day trips away. Gone was the monthly night out for the two of us. We were finding ourselves becoming isolated from society because we couldn’t afford to be part of it any longer.
My husband was falling into a deep depression. He couldn’t get over the fact that he felt like he had let me and the kids down. He hadn’t of course but that’s what he felt.
As if that wasn’t enough punishment the government decided that because I’m a nurse I must pay PRD [Pension-related Deduction] . A tax that was only to be introduced as an emergency tax but for some reason we are still being forced to pay.
When they introduced PRD, that was the end of anything that half resembled a normal life for us. We were already at rock bottom but that destroyed us.
Santa suddenly hadn’t got a lot of money. Toys were second hand from charity shops. Food was bargain basement end of life food. And our mortgage? I just can’t pay it any longer.
I try to pay some money off it but the money that I used to pay for the mortgage is now going to pay USC and PRD. Anything I have left is going on paying for heating, electricity and the kids food and schooling. Our heating is one fire in the sitting room and hot water bottles and that’s it.
And now the banks have decided that they’re going to take our home. They’re going to leave us homeless. I’ve tried to talk to them but they don’t want to know.
I’ve tried to come to a deal with them to pay off as much as I can but it isn’t good enough. They are completely heartless. They want the house.
We are now going through the repossession courts desperately trying to save the last thing we have left, our little family home.
I eat a bowl of porridge before work to fill me up and look forward to beans on toast at 10pm at night when I get home. Sometimes I’ll break out and buy a banana to eat on a break but that would be very rare.
I’m used to being verbally and physically abused in my job. I’ll never get used to the ward being constantly short staffed and always overcrowded though.
Every working day is a nightmare but it’s not as tough as constantly going hungry everyday and coming home to see my husband a shadow of his former self.
The man I love so much who is a proud hardworking man I now believe is on the verge of talking his own life because of the cruelty of this government.
We were once just a normal couple going about our simple lives and now we are a very broken couple who are desperately trying to save the last thing we have left, the roof over our heads.
And so you see the €1000 pay restoration that I’m due in September 2017 that they are making a big song and dance about is buttons compared to what they have taken from me. That €1000 will amount to no more than €50 per month and I’ll have to wait almost another year for it.
Yet here I am hemorrhaging close to €1000 per month more in taxes than what I was a few years ago to bail out the very same banks that are now trying to bail me, my husband and kids out of our home. We now have to live on fresh air. We are poverty stricken.
That’s the thanks we get for sacrificing so much. He lost his job and I was forced to pay almost a thousand euros a month to the government in extra taxes.
How in Gods name could we possibly keep living?
Has our government even tried to help us save our home? Not at all.
In fact they haven’t even tried to stop the courts from taking our home at all and yet they are responsible for our home being taken from us.
Have they tried to restore our pay? No. Instead they are trying to lay the blame at our feet that if they restore any of our pay that we will put this country into another recession. How dare they. They talk about recovery non stop. What bloody recovery? The only ones I see in recovery are the banks and all the self serving politicians!
Not one of them have tried to help us and yet they’re happy enough to hand themselves pay rises of €5000 each. They make me want to vomit. Where are these TD’s and politicians?
Why aren’t they helping us as they were elected to do? Why aren’t they made to earn their big financial rewards? None of them care. Not one of them.
And so that’s my story about how life for me and my family has been since we were all forced to bail out banks.
This government destroyed us completely.
I’m a nurse. I’m no longer a proud nurse. I’m well and truly broken and I don’t think I’ll ever live a normal life again.”
A message sent today to Facebook page Support for Nurses, Midwives and Frontline Staff in Ireland, and posted this afternoon.
Earlier: Restoration Drama
Support for Nurses, Midwives, and Frontline Staff Ireland
“This government destroyed us completely.”
Ad to that the Governments of the last 30 years or so. All in it for the short term gain.
What is ‘PRD’ by the way?
Pension-Related Deduction. Applies to only certain public servants, and eats up about 10% of pretax income.
That is actually heart-breaking to read. I went through my own troubles with reduced earnings and the bank trying to take my home from me. I didn’t have an unemployed partner and children to support too.
Even so, there were times where I just wanted to give up. The bank were completely lacking in humanity throughout my entire interaction with them. I hope things get better for this woman and her family.
yawn hold on till I get my violin. Now is the time for government to spend on infrastructure while bond rates are low and actually invest in a future not appeasing unions public sector pay for menial jobs, that would be the real short term gain and travesty.
Here it is, folks, the worst comment ever posted
Who appointed you the quality controller for Broadsheet? Jog on.
So you agree with that comment Neilo?
I don’t. At all. Read mine elsewhere.
Change your name dude, Yoda wouldn’t make dumb assumptions like that, fairness in…
Thats someones opinion. You jog on
Yeah, you tell ‘er jackson, with ‘er menial job. Have a smashing Christmas too, you big soppy teddy.
You are a scumbag.
Probably a Fine Gaeler, because no other political ideology would support that ignorant and insensitive line. And if you think nursing is menial, wait for the day you’re lying in a hospital bed, 100% dependent on a nurse to do everything for you. And I hope you suffer.
It may surprise you to learn that not only do many supporters and members of Fine Gael support the health service, but many may actually work in it.
I know the figures, you don’t. you only know anecdotal sentimental shite posted on your facebook feed.
Never underestimate a Fianna Failer for ignorance either….remember how ordinary people ended up in this position in the first place? ‘Haughey’s Disease’ infected two generations of that party (don’t forget Bertie) and was complicit in corrupting segments of the public service packing the quangos with their cronies’.
Remember they’re mates are still lurking in the shadows, rubbing their hands and linking their greedy lips anticipating the next time they’ll get their hands on on the leavers of power…
Keep the main political parties weak, and continue to vote for Indepents and small parties
Ps I have every sympathy for this lady, I know many like her. But don’t be conned into thinking the mainstream parties will give you back what they stole in the first place!
I hope this post is allowed to stay up… You should [redacted], with comments like that aimed at someone in such a bad time is disgusting and you don’t deserve to be a live to repeat them.
Classy – don’t you work in some capacity in the health services?
Yes but the above post is clearly from some one with no functioning heart. So the health service cant help
Yes that poster was a tool, but I think that yourself and Yoda_ would have a bit more class and sense not to sink to his/her level (and then several levels below it again).
Yeah ok, agreed. My stupidity answering him.
Calls for ‘kill your self’ are the ramblings of intolerant neanderthal numpty snowflake wannabes…
init
Meant to say too, tell your husband (as I’m sure you do) focus on the kids now and keep things as positive as possible for them. Your husband should feel no shame, no sense of uselessness because he’s a Dad, which is about the most useful thing you can be. Work and jobs will come and times will get better and easier.
The people who caused this crisis (laissez faire politicians, egotistical bankers and developers and their friends in the media) will eventually pay their price for their crimes, one way or another.
No they won’t pay the price. That’s why generation after generation continue to screw each other over.
BS please take me off moderation, what is it, 8 months this year so far?
We’ve all been there, in fairness :)
“One way or another.”
What does that mean?
That there’s a way that is known, and a number of others that are not, but they are still pools of potential ways, young Grasshopper… for it is the way…
“The people who caused this crisis (laissez faire politicians, egotistical bankers and developers and their friends in the media) will eventually pay their price for their crimes, one way or another”
You forgot public service unions.
Yours is a tough and not unusual story, more’s the pity. Nurses are thanked all the time, or should be. You want a pay rise? There’s nothing wrong with that as nursing is a bloody tough way to make a living.
Let us not forget the root cause of these problems.
Massive government pay increases for public sector workers in the years up to 2008 (doled out to buy elections by FF) combined with the collapsing of an already narrowed the tax base resulted in national bankruptcy.
https://www.esri.ie/pubs/WP270.pdf (see Table 1) for the full mindboggling extent of the public service pay increases in that time.
Your facts and figures have no place here
+1
The vast majority of the money that was borrowed over the last few years went on the public sector wage bill, rather than bailing out the banks; an anonymous internet story doesn’t change the fact the we don’t have the money to start awarding pay increases to public servants willy-nilly.
Yes.
Take a look at how much servicing the bailout costs, compared to the public sector wage bill.
Even if there had been no bank bailout, we would have need to borrow billions each year to fund current expenditure.
That’s correct. Look at the facts.
Yep, absolutely nothing to do with foisting bondholder gambling debts on the exchequer, no siree
Not nothing, just less….
+1
This is correct and the bill for PUBLIC SECTOR PAY is so high there is little left over to pay for PUBLIC SERVICES. Thats why there is so many people waiting on hospital beds and why the garda stations closed, PS are over pensioned, and over paid. And now we’re to pay extra for ALL the nurses because this anonymous letter is a bit of a tear jerker. Hey broadsheet how about you get a letter from one of the Créche workers on min wage and ask them how they manage eh???
Christ, what a reductive mess of a post.
Public sector pay and public services are the same thing.
You cannot have public services with out people to administer these services.
And what about nurses who are paying through the nose for childcare?
You are just making up nonsense, to back up your lack of empathy.
“You are just making up nonsense” – This in an anonymous letter, littered with monetary errors and from a dubious/biased source posted at a very cruel time (winter for maximum patient risk) when the unions are poised to strike purely over pay.
And you sir do not understand that if the PAY bill was lower the SERVICES AND STAFF levels could be better. Each nurse does not come equipped with a ward, that has to be paid for separately. What part of that is difficult for you to comprehend?
“You cannot have public services with out people to administer these services” – wtf is IT for then? Go and find me clerical workers in the private sector – they’re all but extinct. The public sector is SUPPOSED to exist to provide services to the public, not to create lifelong jobs and unfunded pensions to it’s members. The real front line worker is the private sector worker whose pension was raided to pay off the PS and banks and who can always be relied upon to take a tax hit at any time
Im just waiting on the same cretins from yesterday to come out with the same old crap about how she’s paid more than enough already.
Get a grip, man. You made a holy show of yourself yesterday and are off to a poor start today as well: directing people to kill themselves.
You think what you want, your choice. But when someone makes comments like that scumbag above did he deserves to have his life ended, he’s clearly a horrible person. That women is basically drowning in fear of losing her home and to be so fearful of your husband killing himself. Oh please don’t embarrass your self trying to throw out labels.
You guys need to tone down the anger. This is a serious issue don’t ruin with your irrelevant egoist posting
Your right, I again lowered myself to that let level.
+1
‘€1000 per month more in taxes than what I was a few years ago’
I’d love to see the actual figures for the amounts in tax being paid per month.
If shes a nurse then easily paying that.
I’ll bet you would.You seem like the kid if the teacher asked for a volunteer to carry her computer bag would have his hand up before she opens her mouth
What’s wrong with volunteering to help carry a teacher’s computer (laptop?) bag?
Is someone is paying €12K extra per year, their salary must be pretty sizeable to begin with.
Yeah, that’s clearly a mistake. Maybe she meant €1000 a year? In which case I’m not sure if an extra €83 a month will help with a mortgage. Very sad story all the same.
I should say both sides of every story need to be looked at. More than likely she workers over her normal hours because of lack of staff and desperate for money. Working in the public sector I know the overtime pay can be good, my place wont pay it but anyway, but when you earn overtime pay all pension deduction go up but only your normal salary deduction goes towards the pension. So just on that you pay extra you actually never get back, so extra tax basically. Then the usc and so so jumps up monstrously. I’ve stated before I’m not high up in my place of work yet I can easily pay 600-700 a month in total stoppages. So a nurse if doing above the normal week would pay well more. Plus some sections dont get paid for the first hour of work. I was lucky not to get this cut.
Considering her husband has no income she’d be paying less tax as she’d be filling jointly. Never let facts get in the way of a good moan.
You can’t pay your mortgage. That’s not our problem. Go rent somewhere you can afford.
It is impossible to take seriously any piece that has such selective use of facts. The facts that are quoted (net loss of €1k a month) are nonsense unless she is on a consultant’s salary, and if she was she would not be complaining.
There have been lots of these stories over the last few years (http://www.irishtimes.com/news/we-are-the-silent-poverty-class-there-is-absolutely-no-help-and-no-one-is-listening-1.553294) and not a single one ever says:
-Pre-bust income (gross and net)
-Post-bust income (gross and net)
-Mortage interest cost
-Total mortgage
The fact is that in almost all parts of Ireland an experienced nurse’s salary is enough for a reasonable standard of living for a family, particularly if you are sharing tax credits and don’t have childcare costs, which would appear to be the case here.
My suspicion is that there is legacy debt from the husband’s business and/or a big house purchase here. This is very difficult and miserable on a personal level. But it is not really anything to do with her net hourly wage, which is at very worst 12% less than it was in 2008.
+2
My suspicion is that this letter is a fake designed solely to tug heart strings and foment support for the absolutely scandalous behaviour of the PS unions. They have form in this regard, look at this and then contrast the commenters to the sadly gullible ones we have on Broadsheet http://www.irishtimes.com/news/we-are-the-silent-poverty-class-there-is-absolutely-no-help-and-no-one-is-listening-1.553294
It does have a bit of a ‘gardaí sleeping in their cars’ ring to it.
+1
It’s a good article and difficult to read. I suggest you sell the house and move somewhere more affordable. It will be tough to move the kids and so on but you will regain your pride and dignity. Also if your rent is less than the current mortgage you wil have more in your pocket.
Your husband sounds like a proud man but needs to man up. No ones gonna give his old life back to him. He should do some courses and retrain if he can’t get work I. His old domain. The process will give him a sense of achievement in and of itself .
+1
There’s nothing more admirable than fake sympathy delivered with a good kicking.
What? Seems like good advice to me.
Really? To me, it seemed unasked for, patronising, dismissive and completely unsympathetic.
It’s posted on the web, facebook and a comment forum… ie comments invited
Seemed that way to me too.
Also it’s kind of trite nonsense.
That’s because you’re a cynical type who loves nothing better than to play the man and not the issue. The issue is that the lady can’t afford to pay her mortgage in her current financial circumstances. This is something she can address. The mental health issues are more complex and I agree you will have an argument there that I appeared insensitive. However I’ve gone through similar events myself as have many people. So my perspective is delivered from the benefit of experience and reality. Sorry.
Of course, if the economy had not crashed, this nurse & family would give any increased property equity to the bank.
It would be heartless not to.
To the nurse and your family:
Reach out to trusted people to support you emotionally. Its obvious that you are both under enormous strain and are at breaking point. Your employer may have staff support in place.
It is very difficult to make decisions when there is so much pressure on.
In dealing with the bank: get legal help, get everything in writing. Do no be afraid of going to court.
http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/housing/losing_your_home/home_repossession.html
You are a hard working family who have been through the mill. You have not shirked your responsibilities, you just need a break. The judge usually tells all parties to go away and talk for 6 months to come to an arrangement.
If your husband is a tradesman, investment in construction is starting to happen again. Skilled tradesmen will be looked for again. Put a plan in place in getting prepared to return to work and talk to someone about it. http://www.inou.ie/workingforwork21/
Your situation is absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. You are right, you have done nothing wrong.
+ 1 and well said Dubloony.
On an unrelated note, thanks BS for allocating avatars to each associated e-mail [I presume]; at the very least it aids in identifying personalities and their multiple usernames.
P.S. I love purple :)
That’s a very sad, heartbreaking account. Its really does show how hard it is for some families to even function in this country. Ireland’s politics needs an Overhaul! To begin with TD’s should have a 10 Pay year freeze after a 25K reduction, and a reduction in pensions. The current money they get is unsustainable, and most importantly THEY FAIL to deliver a viable, fair, sustainable country.
We need politicians who are in it for the country, not just the money. We need to sort out the mercanaries from the good. Put you money where your mouth is, literally!
Where do you begin with a story like this? I have no idea, this is usually the situation that makes families emmigrate, but I know thats not possible for everyone. It seems that she has run out of options here. Ireland is NOT a socially minded country, it is an extreme Capitalist country obsessed with its Economy. Only numbers matter. Things will not sort themselves out, you need to make a big decision and escape.
The Social Partners Agreement (in particular “Programme for Prosperity and Fairness” and “Sustaining Progress”) took too much, given the security that comes with a public sector job. My understanding is that the public sector pension was not accounted for and job security would be tricky to quantify. Either way, the increment should have been linked to private sector salary indices – similar pay for similar work and all that, so that the increment can be negative – the labour market flexibility restoring competitiveness during the recession. These are not my views, this is just true to the spirit of “benchmarking”.
It’s ideal to have public sector security during a recession and then be able to take to the street when economy takes off again in an organised assembly. The two-tier system that came with the recession lies on the hands of the trade unions – looking after the longer term members at the expense of newcomers…but I would be almost certain that this is what Jack O’Connor was advocating at the time (see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZat0Kbzlsg)
Surely as a public worker with a job, the question is not about her pay levels, but how her private sector husband has been treated by the system?
If she wants my private sector job, which is paid less with no pension she can have it, she just need the 7 years of college I did and years of interning.
Nurses need to remember higher pay means higher taxes for everyone.
What do mean by “how her husband has been treated by the system” he would be getting long term unemployment benefit and possibly mortgage relief along with whatever state training scheme he’d like. Ireland is an amazing country to be unemployed in, just look at how much is spent on social welfare.
Look this is all very sad – and many comments on here are unacceptable – but try looking at it from a private sector perspective, I could give you many similar examples of private sector employees who lost their jobs – full stop. Those who were “lucky” enough to keep their jobs (myself included) lost whatever pensions they had, They had salaries slashed in half and had to give up healthcare plans, childcare and any other “luxury” items, They too had similar problems, similar woes, They didn’t, however, have the chance to get it back. They could only hope to start again, reskill or move away. They didn’t have the government looking for ways to appease them and overpaid union bosses inciting them to industrial action. I just can’t find any empathy or sympathy for the public sector.
I’ve total sympathy (empathy, even!) for people in the private sector who have seen their wages and conditions savaged over the past few years. I don’t really understand why that prevents you from having sympathy with public sector workers who are also suffering. Private sector workers can join unions, too, and fight against the injustices that are thrown at them – and they’d probably get a lot of sympathy, particularly if they’re suffering at the expense of profit levels being maintained. I’ve never understood the attitude of: I have it bad, and I hate it, so you should have it bad and hate it too. Why not stand in solidarity with people who are fighting for things to be better – or better yet, join the fight to better things for yourself?
So your solution is for everyone in the country to join a union and stand around in the street with a placard crying “it’s JUST not FAIR” until we all get our money back. Cool. Union bosses will be richer than God and we’ll have the Germans back in. Stroll on comrade
+1
Surely the bank should have helped more? Which one is it? PS only the Irish ones were bailed out by our government
Sounds like Bank of Ireland
I wish the public sector and private sector would unite and demand abolishment of the USC , then we all get a bump. I know that loss of that money to the state purse would put a strain on something, but I just dont trust to government to apply that loss sensibly , they would cut something necessary rather than stop feeding their sectional interests.
I wish public sector unions would strike better , whats the point in downing tools and hurting the public who support you? Strike differently, refuse to work with outside ‘consultants’ , refuse to spoon feed ministers at leaders questions, by not providing them with answers. Close the Dail bar. Provide the opposition TD will the same information the government gets. Refuse all favours from TD’s
Im sure you can think of better ones than me
PS to public servants , the words ‘pay restoration’ are like a red rag to some people, just ask to be fairly compensated.
If services public/civil stopped dealing with ‘outside consultants’ it’d collapse, imo
health and transport would
heart-breaking and incredibly frustrating. i really hope something turns around for this girl and her family. can’t believe there’s actual comments on here responding negatively to this. there really are some horrible people in our midst.
are nurses on minimum wage?
Broadsheet might want to also post a second post from this women.
Where she’s calling for people to attend an anti-eviction meeting in Tullamore on saturday.
This meeting is being organized by
(i) the Irish Democratic Party (splinter of Direct Democracy Ireland Ben Gilroy & the land league types)
(ii) the Hub
these are the clowns you see shouting down judges and threatening Bank staff, receivers & judges throughout the country side. not fans of foreigners either.
Freeman logic is strong with this one.
It’s been a while since Broadsheet went all Freeman, tbh. Their ‘I am my own sovereign country’ nonsense got overtaken by the ‘we already pay’ water brigade.
We’re overdue.
I guess if you run a country where the cost of living is so insanely expensive no amount of pay increases for the public sector or private sector are ever going to be enough to save Irelands middle/working class. The country is broken, it has been mismanaged for 30 years. the taxpayer always bears the brunt of the bad decisions made by our repeatedley incompetent governments.
BRING DOWN THE COST OF LIVING YOU IDIOTS!
“BRING DOWN THE COST OF LIVING YOU IDIOTS!”
Across the board payrises for PS and semi-state workers, as the unions are agitating for at the moment, will have the opposite effect.
Give us your invaluable advice on how to do this, then?
The Government has taken from those who cannot afford to give in order to
to rescue Merkels bankrupt Banks, its past time there was a National Strike
never mind Jack O’Connor pussy footing, he and his cohorts accepted all this
if the Public Sector unions refused to handle deductions for USC, Property Tax
and anything else that was conjured up to effect the bank bale out, it was all
over, and it may yet come to that, how can the ordinary worker pay a Mortgage
or even Buy a House, this type of injustice was tackled head on by the Tenant
Farmers in 1880, the time has come again, as to ESRI and indeed the CSO
+ the Central Bank its long past time to down size them and maybe shut them down, and throw in the Dail Bar, patrons of the latter should be breathalized before they enter the assemblies, since they passed laws about drink driving, its time it was applied in the Houses Parliament.
Boo fupping hoo. Sure nursing is a noble vocation but you’re not the only one working 50-60 hours a week just to tread water.
Fupping tram drivers, bus drivers, garda, nurses and teachers complaining how they deserve more because they used to have it, join the club lads. The ‘pay restoration’ white elephant, Entitlement Ireland is still alive and well. Let’s ignore that the country can’t afford it, after all why should that matter? Whether ‘pay restoration’ is right or wrong is entirely beside the point.
Those still creaming it are TDs, the law, financial services and consultant doctors. Surprise, surprise all the sectors of the economy that our Troika friends failed to reform and that our government never will.
Wait a minute you want the private sector tax payer to increase the salary of EVERY PS nurse to 2007 “benchmarked” levels because of *your* personal circumstances. Just… wow.
This nurse seems confused as to why the government hasn’t given in to the union demands like they used to, even though it guarantees votes, here’s why : Current Irish debt: €208,962,267,652 and they borrowed 2 billion more just for PS pay this year too.
Oh and before anyone gets uppity I’d like to point out that average pay in the public sector is 50pc higher than average pay in the private sector. THAT DOES NOT TAKE INTO ACCOUNT THEIR STATE GUARANTEED PENSION
curmudgeon, compare like-with-like.
The average Civil Servant is older and more qualified that the average private sector worker.
Haha thanks Cian I needed a good laugh. Must be why the PS is a model of efficency.
Husband: Re-train and get a job. NEXT?
This is heartbreaking to read. I have shared your letter and would like our government to be able to purchase your house and leave you in it as social housing which you can always live in.
I believe the man shed community groups are really helpful for many fellas like your husband.
Wishing you and your family the very best.
I have nothing but admiration for nurses.
Nurses are in huge demand and well paid in many other countries. In this woman’s position, I would seriously consider emigrating.
I’m just leaving this here because it’s the
bestonly opportunity I’ll ever get.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGbRSvRcGK0
Isn’t the tradesman economy booming again? Surely the husband can get a well paid job again? There are many people trying to support a family on a single wage after suffering massive increases in tax in the recession. I agree with other posters, bringing down the cost of living is the key, especially increasing the supply of new homes to decrease rents and house prices.
Hey SB,
I want to buy the avatar that was assigned to you. How much do you want for it?