FURTHER TALKS aimed at resolving a threatened strike by more than 10,500 electricians from next week are expected to take place over the weekend.
Last night the Technical Engineering and Electrical Union (TEEU), which represents the electricians, said that it would attend any talks to resolve the dispute over pay with electrical contractors.
However it said that the strike notice for Monday remained in place.
The TEEU is set to place pickets at more than 200 construction sites and at a number of manufacturing firms around the country over a pay claim that would push the rate for electricians up by more than 11 per cent, from an existing €21.49 to €23.98 an hour.
TEEU general secretary designate Eamon Devoy said that his members were looking for money due to them since 2006/2007.
The Electrical Contractors Association, the body that represents some of the larger contractors, has said its members were not in a position to pay the increases sought by the electricians.
The Dublin Airport Authority told staff in an internal bulletin yesterday the electricians’ union had informed the authorithy that it had no dispute with it.
Last night the the main industrial relations trouble-shooting body, the National Implementation Body, urged all the parties to re-engage with the Labour Relations Commission.
It said that this needed to be done “to explore the full range of issues at the centre of the dispute with a view to averting the threatened action”.
Minister of State for Labour Affairs Dara Calleary also said that the parties should use the State’s industrial relations machinery to resolve the dispute.
The director general of the Construction Industry Federation Tom Parlon urged the union to call off the strike “and to engage with us with the genuine objective of finding a solution”.
“TEEU seems to be making a virtue about the scale of the impact that this strike will have not just on construction but on the wider economy . . . Ireland is losing foreign direct investment at a pace unprecedented in any other economy. The impact that the threat of strike action has on our international reputation is unquantifiable,” he said.
However, Mr Devoy said that it had tried on four occasions to negotiate with employers on the basis of terms of reference proposed by the Labour Court.
“Our members have shown extreme patience in waiting for a pay increase agreed by the main employer bodies in April 2008 and have not received a single penny, although clients of those same companies were being billed on the basis of that increase being applied,” he said.
If the strike should go ahead next week, work on a number of construction projects such as the Terminal 2 development at Dublin airport, the new Intel project in Co Kildare, the Corrib gas project and the new Lansdowne Road stadium could be affected.