Government urged to make bereavement leave the same for all workers
The Government has been urged to streamline leave entitlements for public servants after it emerged some workers get five days off when a relative dies, while others get nothing.
Fórsa members have asked the union to seek equal bereavement, marriage and graduation leave for members after they voted for them to be standardised at the union’s conference last week.
One delegate at the conference said a move to abolish inequality of leave would be sensible.
“Bereavement is bereavement and grief is grief,” he said, and questioned why one worker might get five days off while another might get nothing, or maybe three days.
“It makes no sense to me,” he added.
A school secretary told delegates that when a member’s father died, she rang the principal, who asked her to pay for her cover.
She said school secretaries do not have an automatic entitlement to bereavement leave.
Another member whose brother had a cardiac arrest said she had no entitlement to leave when his life-support machine was turned off. The only option was unpaid leave or certified sick leave, she said.
“Why is our loss, our bereavement, any less important than our working colleagues in the education sector?” she asked.
“This leave should be statutory. It shouldn’t be a question of whether or not you are entitled to it. You should know automatically it is there.”
A delegate said she has two brothers in the civil service, working in Revenue and Social Protection. She said every time she goes to a family funeral, they are on bereavement leave, whereas she is on annual leave.
One motion said there is a range of leave entitlements for employees in different sectors. It said some civil and public sector employees are entitled to three days bereavement leave for the death of a relative, while employees in other sectors have no entitlement.
Another motion called on the union’s executive committee to ensure there is a minimum standard of bereavement leave in both the private and public sector.
“Regardless as to where you work or what role you hold, grief is grief and loss is a loss, a minimum standards of bereavement leave should protect all workers in their time of loss,” it said.
Another motion said sick leave, annual leave, bereavement leave and compassionate leave should be the same for all employees in the public sector.
The South Tipperary Health and Community Branch argued that lower entitlements should be “brought up” to the level of more enhanced schemes in other sections of the public sector.
A separate motion called for government departments to appoint bereavement liaison officers to help the families of deceased staff members and those who have been bereaved.
Fórsa general secretary Kevin Callinan said the union would “look at it”, when asked whether it would move to standardise leave, although he said this might be restricted by the current wage agreement.
He said the issue may have to be considered during negotiations on future agreements.
The Department of Public Expenditure was contacted for comment.