Unions at Independent Newspapers are to hold meetings with management this week to seek guarantees about terms and conditions for staff remaining in the company.
An application for an all-out picket at the company by unions that voted last week for industrial action was heard by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions yesterday. If ICTU grants the application, unions not directly involved in the current dispute with the company, including the National Union of Journalists, would be balloted on a possible all-out strike.
The strike is likely to be averted if management provides sufficient guarantees that collective agreements with unions will be adhered to in the future.
Unions accused the company of breaking such agreements by threatening to sack staff in a number of sections who failed to accept a severance package by last Friday.
It ultimately secured the 205 redundancies sought, however, when that number met the deadline for acceptance of the deal.
Members of the three unions directly affected - SIPTU, the GPMU and the TEEU - had balloted to strike over the company's actions.
With the threat of compulsory redundancies removed, they went ahead yesterday with an application to the ICTU for an all-out picket.
Unions insisted that they continued to have serious issues with the company. At least one union branch was told by management last month that its collective agreement with the company was being suspended.
Members of other branches were told they would be receiving new contracts, which unions say had not been agreed.
Ms Ethel Buckley, secretary of SIPTU's clerical branch, which meets management tomorrow, said "cast-iron assurances" would be sought that collective agreements would be honoured.
The branch would also want guarantees that the terms and conditions of the staff remaining would be "as per the collective agreements", she said.
Other unions and branches, it is understood, will be seeking similar assurances.
The dispute threatens to overshadow talks on a new national pay deal, which could begin later this week. Unions say they want the employers' body, IBEC, to address the company's refusal to agree that the dispute be referred to the Labour Court.
The company said it had already been to the court and that the industrial relations procedures had been exhausted.
