$6M pay-out for stress

Press, 1 June 1989, Page 4

$6M pay-out for stress

PA Auckland Taxpayers will fork out $6 million to compensate education workers for stress caused by the uncertainty about their jobs after October 1.

Two-thirds of them will still have jobs after that date. The 3000 workers in the Education Department, education boards and multi-school boards would get $2OOO each to compensate for the stress the loss of their jobs would cause them/ a Public Service Association spokeswoman who did not wish to be named said. Although officially called simply a "payment” — because of the employers’ fear of setting a precedent — the sum was based on stress, she said. The Education Department’s director-general, Dr Russ Ballard, denied the payment was for stress. It was a productivity bonus payment, to compensate staff for the increased work they were doing as a result of the Government’s reshuffling of education administra-

tion. “We’re expecting them to pick up the pace,” Dr Ballard said. The workers would still be paid extra for overtime. “There’s a lot of extra work being carried out which doesn’t always translate into overtime payments.” The workers would get $5OO at the end of June and $l5OO on September 30. With details of education service centres — which would take over some of the services now supplied by education boards — and reforms of tertiary education yet to be announced, it was impossible to say how many jobs would disappear, Dr Ballard said. He expected the Minister of Education, Mr Lange’s, estimate of 600 to 900 lost jobs to be close. The P.S.A. spokeswoman said a big part of

the workers’ tasks involved phasing out their present positions. “They are digging their own graves.” In the reshuffling due to be largely finished by October, only about 1000 jobs would disappear, she said. The jobs of 300 teachers’ college workers were unaffected by the changes and the department and the State Services Commission had guaranteed that another 800 employed directly by secondary school boards would be employed by the new school trustee boards. These 1100 staff would not receive the stress payments. The P.S.A.’s vice-presi-dent, Mr Bernard McDavitt, said the union had negotiated similar retention payments for staff of the Maori Affairs Department and the Government Printing Office.