I can understand why people would be upset about losing a Final Salary Pension but to strike over it is counter productive, especially in the current economic climate.
Is prehaps the indication that they need to cancel these types of pension to improve their finances not an indicator that if they don't the employees might not haver a job to strike about.
It's a recession people, stop being greedy and suck it up otherwise it'll only get worse, be thankful you have a job cause not even a Union is going to save you from a economy hitting the bottom.
> I can understand why people would be upset about losing a Final Salary Pension but to strike over it is counter productive, especially in the current economic climate.
I understand what you're saying, and if they had said 'everyone takes a 5% pay cut until things improve, or mass redundancies' then I'd have less sympathy for the dissenters. However, shutting the final salary scheme is permanent. You can bet that CSC won't give it back once the economy swings back to a boom cycle.
So industrial action by this private company's employees is going to mean all our hospitals, trains, buses, tubes and power stations will stop working (in whole or part). That's just great. How come though, control of our armed forces isn't in the hands of a private company (French or German it won't make any difference) yet though - this government need to get the ball rolling a bit faster.
"It's a recession people, stop being greedy and suck it up otherwise it'll only get worse, be thankful you have a job cause not even a Union is going to save you from a economy hitting the bottom."
Intriguingly one might suggest that it it is a Union which will cause many people to _stop_ having a job.
Step forward, the Communication Workers Union, that hangover from the 1970s...!
One more to add to the list of companies facing action from their employees, the sooner these companies get a slapping the quicker everyone get back to work. Employees are the corner stone of any company and shouldn't be treated like disposable assets, while fat cat management milk huge salaries and bonuses. Maybe the country grinding to a halt will make everybody sit up and come to an amicable conclusion.
For most people in a final salary pension scheme, the pension provision would have been a significant factor in taking the job in the first place. The pension is a form of deferred remuneration, after all. For companies to tell employees who have given them years of loyal service that they intend in effect to rob them of even a part of that deferred remuneration is just that: robbery.
In many cases the only reason that these pension schemes are "unaffordable" is that the companies chose to take extended contribution holidays while the economy was booming and stock price inflation looked like it would more than cover their pension liabilities. Predictably this has now come back to bite them in a big way, but due to weak legislation they are able to simply push the pain onto their employees.
It all stinks.
I think this recession is a lot of companies 'get-out-of-jail-free' card when it comes to FSP, I don't know of many companies that want to keep them, they are a costly pension, I'd bet my house on all of these companies that withdraw the FSP will not be re-introducing them.
I consider myself lucky that I still work for an employer that has them (although for how long is another story).
Unions are a throwback that could definately be thrown out. I think the greed attitude definately stems from the Union rather than the employee, in the case of the Royal Mail, it's a shame that the moderisation programme will make some people redunant but it's a 'break a few eggs to make an omlette' senario, the omlette being the continuation of Royal Mail as a business.
So only the public sector still has a defined benefit pension and gets pay rises..... I can see where the 200bn a year deficit might be coming from.
It seems the recession is the perfect excuse for these firms to drive through a whole raft of cuts:
- Widescale redundancies.
- Site consolidations.
- Pay cuts.
- Pay freezes.
- Extensive use of IST visas to bring in staff on the cheap.
- Almost complete neglect of modern apprenticeship and graduate schemes.
- Slashing benefits
- Butchering pension schemes.
And last time I looked these firms weren't all necessarily in trouble. Most of this is cynical pursuit of the bottom line by firms growing fat on big government contracts, all within a lax framework put in place by a Government that does less and less to protect the rights of workers.
And people think we should get rid of unions? Leave the little guy on his own to fight against huge corporations?
Having been through this personally and had the joy, as a staff association rep, to learn more about pensions and pension legislation than any sane person would possibly want to know, it's important to remember that :
accrued final salary benefits cannot be taken away
they haven't announced *how* it's being closed
The former point means that, workers who have years of FSP built up, will still get it, but how it accrues in successive years will need to be calculated (usually some calculation on RPI).
The latter is important - are they closing to new entrants (something most did years ago); are they stopping the accrual for existing members; plus many more.
Finally and particularly importantly, any change to a persons pension requires express consent, not implied or assumed.