Irish Ferries last night rejected a Labour Court call for it to shelve its controversial outsourcing plan.
Irish Ferries is intending to continue with its controversial outsourcing plan
In a recommendation issued yesterday, the court said the company should not proceed with its plan to lay off up to 543 seafarers and replace them with cheaper labour from abroad.
It told the company to honour a three-year agreement on seafarers' pay and conditions, reached with unions in June last year.
The recommendation was rejected within hours by the company, which described it as being "incapable of acceptance and implementation".
It repeated its assertion that it had no choice but to implement the redundancy and outsourcing programme in order to ensure it remained competitive.
The company's stance increases the difficulties faced by the Government in its attempts to secure a new partnership deal.
Unions have decided not to enter talks on a successor to Sustaining Progress in the absence of specific commitments from the Government on measures to prevent exploitation of workers.
The talks had been due to begin tomorrow but have now been postponed indefinitely. The unions' stance arose directly as a result of the Irish Ferries controversy.
Unless the Government moves to prevent the company from proceeding with its plan, which involves hiring agency seafarers on hourly pay of €3.60, it is unlikely that unions will enter talks.