There are no proposals to defer benchmarking payments, the Government has said.
Asked whether deferral would be considered at a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday as a means of avoiding public spending cuts, as reported yesterday in the Sunday Tribune, a spokesman for the Minister for Finance, Mr McCreevy, said: "Certainly not that I'm aware of."
The report said that some ministers believed the Government had no choice but to review the benchmarking awards due to pressure on the public finances.
However, Mr McCreevy's spokesman and other Government sources cited a speech by the Minister on Friday when asked if the report was accurate.
Mr McCreevy said in his speech to the plenary session of the Sustaining Progress forum that the Government was committed to paying the benchmarking payments. He added, however, that payment was conditional on the delivery of productivity improvements in the Civil Service.
He repeated these views on Today FM yesterday.
In Friday's speech, he said the public sector pay bill presented an enormous challenge to the Government. He said: "You all know that hardly a day goes by without particular comment being made in the media about the cost of these increases under Sustaining Progress, and especially about the cost of benchmarking. The Government is committed to paying them, but this commitment is not unconditional.
"The Government will meet the bill on the basis of the conditions set down in the agreement - that is, no industrial action and the achievement of real change which will improve the delivery of public services."
In a speech yesterday to the MacGill summer school in Co Donegal, the Tánaiste, Ms Harney, defended the social partnership model but said it was not a replacement for politics.
"It is not a replacement for decision-making by an elected Dáil and by government. It is not a replacement, conversely, for an effective political opposition, a vital role in a civilised society.
"It would, however, take on the appearance of a replacement, if consensus were not challenged, if government shirked decisions, if opposition limited the scope or strength of these challenges."