The Government and public sector unions reached agreement early on the morning of June 8 on a proposed extension to the Lansdowne Road Agreement (LRA).

The proposals in the main, deal with the pay and pension conditions of serving public service workers.

However, the proposals confirm that for the duration of the agreement, retired public service workers will receive pension increases in line with pay increases received by their peers currently in employment.

The proposed Agreement is for a 3 year period Jan 2018 to Dec 2020.  If agreement is reached the question of ‘pension parity’ is confirmed for the duration.

The cohort of public servants who retired in the past 5 years (since 1 March 2012) will be the first to gain. This group retired on a reduced salary scale. As this scale is set to increase during the lifetime of the agreement, those whose pensions are linked to this scale will also see their pensions increase.

Public servants who retired prior to 1 March 2012, the bulk of RTAI members,  have their pensions linked to the pre-paycut scale. As this scale is at present higher than the current teachers’ scale, parity does not immediately arise for this cohort. However, as the teachers’ pay scale increases the pensions of the post 1 March 2012  retirees will become aligned with the pensions of those who retired prior to 1 March 2012.  At that point pension parity becomes an issue for every retiree, irrespective of date of retirement.

Please note that the full detail of the agreement is not yet to hand and further details will be posted over the next number of days.

The RTAI has been campaigning for the preservation of pension parity for many years and views this latest development as very significant and welcome.

At the time of writing, INTO has urged its members to reject the proposals.  However, as Impact and SIPTU are proposing acceptance, it is apparent that the deal will be accepted.

The other aspect worthy of note in the proposals is that full restoration of pension cuts has been kicked down the road to 2020!