Mr. William Quinn:

I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak on this matter. My Name is William Quinn. I am almost 59 years old. I have 32.5 years of service with Dublin City Council. I am one of three area supervisors in the waste management services division, which provides cleansing services, with approximately 40 staff, for the north central regional administrative area of Dublin city. In addition, I deal with divisional attendance management issues and imminent staff pensions.

It is very important to change the existing legislation on the mandatory retirement age for public servants and other workers for a number of reasons. When the original legislation was enacted, life expectancy was only a couple of years more than the mandatory retirement age. That demographic has dramatically changed, and people now live much longer because of better diet, education, housing and medical knowledge. Many of the experts in this field contend that staying as active as possible is very important for our more mature citizens, and one of the ways of doing that is by continuing to work. It is inherently unfair to offer the option of staying on after the age 65 or 66 only to those who came into public service after a certain date, namely April 2004, providing they are fit enough to carry out the full range of their duties. This is an option that should be equally offered to all public sector staff. Many staff will not want to exercise that option, but it should be available nevertheless. Otherwise, it appears that they are being penalised because of their age and excluded from a benefit afforded to others. Due to the major difficulties in the public sector over the last number of years, there has been an embargo on recruitment. We have lost a lot of very good, talented and experienced staff who have not been replaced. My own division has lost almost 50% of its staff and, if anything, the city has grown upwards, not outwards, and does business for far longer every day. This means we are now under pressure to provide more services with far fewer resources. The recruitment embargo is now slowly starting to lift in some public sector areas, but it will still be some time before the benefits unfold. Indeed, some sectors may never recover. It is very important, therefore, to ensure that we have enough mature and experienced people to pass on their vital knowledge to a new generation.

If the legislation is changed there will not be hordes of people in their 60s holding onto jobs at the expense of school and college leavers. Many people are very happy to shake off the yoke of work when their mortgage is paid and their children have moved on. However, it will help to prevent many public sector retirees born from 1956 onwards from having to sign on for jobseeker's benefit and allowances until they qualify for their State contributory old age pension. At that age, and because of the type of work they do, they would be unlikely to get a new job. It will help these people to stay healthier for longer because of their active contribution through work and thus they will be at less risk of becoming a burden on the State through long-term ill health. Furthermore, it will help the beleaguered public sector pension schemes, which were not designed to cope with today’s demographics. If the legislation is not changed then all public servants hired before 2004, if unsuccessful in finding alternative employment when forced to retire, will have to claim State benefits or allowances for between one and three years, depending on their grade, until they qualify for the State contributory old age pension. That is a horrendous prospect for many of us. I fully endorse the changes advocated by Deputy Anne Ferris.