Fine Gael will table a Private Member's motion in the Dail next week to try to overturn the decision of the Tanaiste, Ms Harney, to abolish 9,500 places on the Community Enterprise Scheme.
Fine Gael's enterprise and employment spokeswoman, Mrs Nora Owen, said she would be tabling the motion after she had learnt that the Tanaiste's decision to abolish the places had not been fully negotiated with the social partners. She claimed yesterday that the social partners had agreed to only 5,000 of the 9,500 cuts.
She said it was "absolutely amazing", in the light of the forthcoming national partnership negotiations, that the Tanaiste should blatantly go against the social partners in this way.
The Fine Gael motion will call for the protection of 37,500 CES places and flexibility on the three-year gap which Ms Harney wants in the scheme. Mrs Owen will also seek an assurance that the 5,000 agreed CES cuts will not take place until the new Social Employment Programme is in place.
FAS offices had only recently been written to for comments on what work would be covered by the new scheme, she said.
Earlier, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions' general secretary, Mr Peter Cassells, told the Fine Gael parliamentary party conference in Clonmel that he did not believe there would be a new national wage agreement, as there did not seem to be a sense of national purpose for such a deal.