Electricians in Birmingham - England

I have been banging on about the pay and bonuses of bankers and financial whiz-kids for months. I have also complained about inflated payments in salaries and bonuses to Chief Executives [formerly town clerks] of towns and cities. But as the various political parties vie with each other to tell us how much they will cut government spending - without any proper plans, of course - we now hear that the lunacy of public sector pay has explored new areas of excess.

An electrician working for Birmingham City Council has been paid - I refuse to suggest that he has "earned" this much - £124,000 last year. And just in case we think this is exceptional, a traffic lights repair man was paid £81,940; drivers of bin carts were paid £50,917 and even the bin emptying dustmen managed £46,000. No doubt the figures will be denied by the council - they are at this moment saying that the figures were "historic" - and that is certainly true. Perhaps, they pay their employees even more now. No doubt some trade union leader will talk about how much lower is their take-home pay - because like everybody else they pay tax and NI. They probably believe that binmen shouldn't pay tax at 40%. These payments are ludicrous, no matter what the excuses about stand-by times, overtime and bonuses. The electrician claimed for £90,000 in overtime. How is this possible? If we assume that £34,000 was his basic pay - which is more than is possible if he has a bonus as well - then he earned 2.64 x his basic pay as overtime. How did he find the hours - even if it was all at double time? He must have worked 7 days per week, 12 hours per day throughout the year with no holidays. Even if he did, the pay is still crackers. They should hire another electrician on basic pay.

If our political parties are going to sort out the debts and the tragedy that is the economy, then the vast payments made to government employees in wages and bonuses and unsustainable pensions, plus the massive payments wasted on socially useless quangos will have to be eliminated. Will any of them do it. They will not. Just as they will bugger up everything else that they touch. We will be lead inexorably down the road to ruin.

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