Secondary teachers have decided to adopt a wait-and-see approach to the benchmarking report. No detailed response to the report will be given by the Association of Secondary Teachers, Ireland, until after a further meeting of its standing committee or executive late next month.
This meeting will determine whether the union will unleash a fresh wave of industrial action in the autumn.
The union's incoming president, Mr P.J. Sheehy, has already signalled that the union is ready to take industrial action if it believes its 30 per cent pay demand has not been seriously addressed.
At yesterday's executive meeting, several of the 23-member standing committee expressed disappointment with the 13 per cent pay rise on offer from the benchmarking review.
The union also deferred any decision on a ballot of its 17,000 members on the recommendations.
The other teaching unions, the Irish National Teachers' Organisation (INTO) and the Teachers' Union of Ireland (TUI), are set to ballot their members on the benchmarking proposals in the autumn.
The key issue for the INTO and the TUI is increasingly the timescale for implementation of the 13 per cent offer. The unions want it paid speedily but the Government wants to delay full payment until 2004, because of the pressure on Exchequer funds.
For the ASTI, the benchmarking report raises wider questions about the future of its two-year pay campaign. The union is anxious to maintain the momentum of this campaign. Sources in the other teaching unions however, say the benchmarking report is now the "only game in town".
Some in the ASTI believe the union should press ahead with its campaign, but others caution that it could again face isolation from the other teaching unions.
In a statement, the ASTI said yesterday's meeting was "an information meeting with no decisions taken on key issues".
Its president, Ms Catherine Fitzpatrick, said: "There are important issues in this report for our members and Standing Committee wishes to give careful consideration to them."
The union is set to hold a special meeting of its 180-member central executive council on the benchmarking report. It may also call a special delegate conference on the review.
Its general secretary, Mr Charlie Lennon, has signalled his support for a ballot of members on benchmarking, but others in the union want a fuller consideration of the report before any ballot.
A special conference could also consider the future of the union's ban on supervision. ASTI members withdrew from "voluntary" supervision in March.
Since then, a government contingency plan - involving the use of non-teaching personnel - has been in place.
A new pay structure for supervision has now been put in place and teachers who opt to do the work will be paid €37 an hour. The Government is also to consider making these payments pensionable.
More than 85 per cent of TUI members voted recently to accept the new deal.