The Government has moved to block the possibility of a new wave of public service pay demands in the wake of the offer being voted upon by gardai. During lengthy discussions on this year's Budget, which will be announced on December 2nd, the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, warned the Cabinet yesterday that the preservation of the "partnership approach" with both public and private sector workers could be put at risk if employees decided there was more to be procured in terms of pay increases and "we end up with a whole new raft of claims".
Following the day-long Cabinet meeting, the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, rejected comments by the general secretary of the Irish National Teachers Organisation, Senator Joe O'Toole, that the pay terms of the Programme for Competitiveness and Work and Partnership 2000 must be renegotiated.
Mr McCreevy said last night that the Government had no intention of breaching national pay policy in its negotiations with the Garda Representative Association or the public service unions.
Earlier yesterday, the director general of Irish Business and Employers Confederation, Mr John Dunne, called on the Government to make it clear that the GRA pay deal could not to be used as "a springboard" for another series of public sector pay claims. He denied that IBEC had given "an imprimatur" to the Government that it could settle with the GRA for terms outside the terms of existing national pay agreements.
The general secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, Mr Peter Cassells, in a brief statement said ICTU "was not asked for and did not give any assurances to the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, that the proposed offer to the GRA was not in breach of national agreements".
Mr Dunne said the social partners had been asked if it was possible "to find if some way could be found to provide an in put for the gardai in a successor for Partnership 2000". IBEC could not countenance any breaches of existing pay guidelines.
"What worries me is a perception gathering ground that when the gardai settle, then other groups will reopen the PCW [Programme for Competitiveness and Work] agenda. That is not acceptable in any circumstances.
Mr Dunne said the position since 1988 had been that certain deals which were negotiated for public service groups would be put on ice under the Programme for National Recovery. "It was accepted these had to be unwound as the economy got better. Unfortunately, as they have been unwound, they have spawned some new deals and exceeded original arrangements put in place."
The system was in danger of becoming inequitable. Workers in the private sector, who were fuelling the competitiveness of the economy, had not done as well as those in the public service under successive national agreements, Mr Dunne said. The action of the INTO general secretary, Mr Joe O'Toole, in threatening to present a new pay claim was "irresponsible, because when someone like Mr O'Toole says this sort of thing it raises expectations".
The economy was "in remarkably good shape" because a model of social partnership had been developed which had taken Ireland out of a serious economic crisis. The challenge, according to Mr Dunne, was to adjust it to meet the challenge of an economy in danger of overheating.
"I believe Partnership 2000 will last to the end of the road and that social partnership is not outdated," he said, "but we have to be sensible about social partnership. If the price of social partnership is an unwillingness to face economic realities and have another round of special increases in the public service, then as far as IBEC is concerned, we are not interested."