A major local government house-building programme should be "an imperative" in any national agreement to succeed Partnership 2000, IMPACT delegates decided at their conference in Bundoran, Co Donegal, yesterday. The union is the largest in the public service, with 36,000 members in the Civil Service, health boards, local authorities and semi-State companies.
Delegates voted overwhelmingly for a series of motions which criticised the failure of the Government to control house prices or ensure that affordable accommodation was available for families on low to middle incomes.
There was loud applause when the union's deputy general secretary, Mr Shay Cody, told the guest of honour, the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, it was "a disgrace and a scandal" that it was "cheaper to rent accommodation in Berlin, Frankfurt, Paris or London than in Dublin".
He said that the unions had supported national agreements to restore the State's finances, protect social services and create jobs. The outcome had far exceeded expectations and the reasons for constraint no longer applied. "Workers now require their day in the sun. Conspicuous consumption is fuelling workers' frustrations. Builders' and speculators' profits are driving house-ownership out of the reach of low and middle earners", Mr Cody said.
Ireland was now at a crossroads. "We can travel the road of a fairly equal society on the north European model, with no enormous differences between rich and poor. Alternatively, we can let it rip and create an American-style three-tier society of very rich, very poor and a middle group. Trade unions do not want the latter."
He criticised the Government for failing to address transport problems. Commuting times had increased to unacceptable levels. Prosperity for many had made Ireland "a more miserable and difficult place to live and work".
Mr Cody said that, as part of any new national agreement, IMPACT would be seeking a flat-rate increase in pay to help redress the balance of successive pay deals, which had favoured higher earners. However, he welcomed the proposals agreed with the Government on a national minimum wage and trade union recognition as steps in the right direction.
Proposing the motion making an extensive programme of local authority house-building "an imperative in any post-P2000 central negotiations", Mr Bobby Carty said: "A third of wage-earners are already squeezed out of the housing market. There is no point in battling for pay increases that are wiped out by house prices and mortgage repayments."
The Bacon Report had identified measures to tackle house prices, "but said nothing about local authority house-building that used to provide 20 to 25 per cent of new accommodation, but now provides less than 10 per cent".
Several delegates attacked the failure of successive governments to include house prices in the Consumer Price Index. The union's general secretary, Mr Peter McLoone, said: "It's an insult to tell ordinary working people that inflation is under control when the biggest burden by far on the household budget is getting heavier and heavier, but is not included in the inflation figures."
Ms Gwyn Grace, an Eastern Health Board delegate, said that everyone in the hall earning less than £30,000 a year should vote for the resolutions calling for action on housing, because none of them would be able to buy their own homes.
Replying to the debate, Ms O'Rourke said that she fully supported the view that economic growth had to be underpinned by social measures to ensure that the benefits reached everyone. Social partnership provided a strategy for tackling the changing global environment.
On housing, she said there was clearly a need for action. Plans being drawn up by the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, to provide for a much larger tranche of housing were at a very advanced stage. She said that strategic planning guidelines for Dublin satellite towns such as Naas, Newbridge and Navan made provision for improved public transport systems, including rail links with the capital.