Tipperary councillor backs demands for equal pay for community workers

It’s time that workers in the community and voluntary sector in Tipperary get equal pay for an equal day’s work, according to Cllr Fiona Bonfield.

Cllr Bonfield said Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil had “shirked their responsibilities” to care workers in Tipperary for too long, outlining the many vital services that these workers provide to people in Tipperary

“Thousands of workers across Section 39 bodies provide vital services in communities across Ireland and in Tipperary, and deserve the same respect and pay restoration as other publicly funded bodies have implemented,” she said.

The Labour Party councillor said that the Government had failed care workers, the workers who keep communities like many day care centres going, for too long.

Labour is demanding that Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil put the pay and conditions of these care workers in Section 39 organisations on the same footing as HSE workers.

Cllr Bonfield pointed out that, unlike trade union members in the public or private sector, care workers in Tipperary had no way to negotiate a pay increase, yet their work was comparable to workers directly employed by the State who, if proposed increases in public sector pay were accepted by union members, will shortly be earning nearly 10% more than they do

“It’s simply not fair,” said the Newport councillor.

Cllr Bonfield said that change can only come by the Government agreeing to increase funding to their organisations which was what Labour is demanding.

“We need the Government to do as it did prior to 2008 which was to provide increases in funding to most Section 39 care and community organisations at a level which allowed them to then pay the wage increases agreed as part of national public service pay agreements” she said.

Cllr Bonfield pointed out that there were high rates of annual turnover of Section 39 workers.