Government plans to change public service pensions will see teachers pay more into their pensions than they will receive in benefits, unions have claimed.
Research commissioned by the ASTI, TUI and the INTO into future teachers' pensions found the new scheme will not meet a criterion under existing arrangements whereby employers are required to make "meaningful" contributions towards staff pensions.
The new pension scheme is being introduced for all public service workers, including teachers, from 2011.
Speaking in Dublin this morning, INTO general secretary Sheila Nunan described the measure as "grossly unfair" and said it could be open to future legal challenge.
As part of the Government’s reform of the pension system, new entrants will have their pension calculated on the basis of career average earnings rather than final salary.
The qualification age for the State pension will rise from 65 to 66 in 2014. It will go up again to 67 in 2021 and up to 68 in 2028.
Currently, the retirement age for public sector workers is 65 and workers are entitled to a tax-free lump sum of one and a half times their salary, and a pension of half the final salary.
The new scheme, according to Ms Nunan, would be “very much less generous than all private sector schemes and on an actuarial basis, would be less valuable than no pension provision whatsoever.”
ASTI general secretary Pat King said the measures will not achieve any savings for the State for at least 40 years.
“The context of this is to trying to save the State expenditure, not one penny will be saved by the State for 40 years, not a penny,” he said.
Membership of the new scheme is compulsory and teaching unions claim this means teachers will be "forced" to join a scheme for which they say they will receive no net benefit.
General secretary of the TUI Peter MacMenamin said the changes were “unnecessary.”
Referring to increases in the PRSI contribution in 1995 and the removal of early retirement in 2004, Mr MacMenamin said the existing scheme is sustainable.
