PROSPECTS for a new national agreement are now extremely bleak, the general secretary of SIPTU Mr Bill Attley has said. And he has ruled out a deal which would be similar to the last PCW, where pay rose 8 per cent over three years.
Mr Attley warned that the trade unions would get what they were seeking "either through partnership or confrontation". He said he was deeply pessimistic on whether a new deal could be struck.
The Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC) is only willing to concede a 4.5 per cent increase over three years but the Irish Congress of Trade Unions wants 12 per cent.
Speaking before addressing the Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association (ISME) a.g.m. in Killarney yesterday, Mr Attley said the sides had not moved one centimetre in five weeks of talks.
Mr Attley said Irish workers had restricted themselves to modest pay increases totalling no more than 8.2 per cent over the past three years. Over the same period, profits on a national scale had shot ahead by as much as 45 per cent.
Previous agreements were concluded because of various problems in the economy. Now there was a boom and employees were entitled to be rewarded.
Employees wanted a share of the action, he said, through pay increases and tax cuts. He reiterated demands for tax cuts of £1 billion and said lower paid workers must be targeted.
He said the talks had been allowed to drift although everyone had agreed a deal would have to be concluded by December 12th, if it was to be balloted on before the Budget. However, he said it was employer organisations and not workers who were being unrealistic.
The Minister for Enterprise and Employment Mr Bruton said yesterday the talks breakdown was clearly very serious. He also said the Government wanted a fourth national pay agreement, but not an agreement at any price.
"I don't think 12 per cent can be offered," he said.
Mr Bruton also said that public spending would have to be tightly controlled. "We have to conform to tight guidelines if we are to meet the Maastricht criteria," he said.
Mr Bruton, who also addressed ISME, said the Government was committed to a tax package for workers. He said it was better to achieve progress through tax relief rather than by giving workers high take-home pay "which would be whittled away".
ISME accused the Government of putting £800 million of tax concessions on the table without demonstrating any ability to meet its borrowing or expenditure targets. It called for tighter control on spending, targeting dole fraud and the black economy, and a lower corporation tax for service companies.
ISME members trenchantly criticised Mr Bruton because they were not represented at the pay talks. He rejected this, saying they had turned down an opportunity to make a contribution before the talks got underway.
