TRADE UNIONS:ONE OF the country's largest trade unions has warned of the prospect of national strikes in the future in opposition to the Government's planned austerity measures.
The Unite trade union said yesterday that it had begun planning for a campaign of civil disobedience and industrial action “that will make clear the level of anger and fortitude that exists among the people who political leaders have failed utterly”.
The general secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Union (Ictu) David Begg said yesterday that there had been no discussions within the organisation regarding either national strikes or campaigns of civil disobedience.
Following the large-scale march and rally at the weekend, the focus of the campaign of congress against the Government’s austerity programme is now expected to move on to the proposal to cut the national minimum wage.
Congress believes the Government will have to introduce legislation to facilitate its plans to reduce the minimum wage by €1 per hour.
Mr Begg said yesterday there was no provision for the Minister for Enterprise to reduce unilaterally the rate of the minimum wage.
He said congress had in recent weeks withdrawn an application submitted to the Labour Court some time ago to have the minimum wage rate increased. He said congress had feared that the Minister could use any report produced by the Labour Court on foot this application to facilitate a cut in the rate of the minimum wage.
The congress campaign is expected now to focus on lobbying Government TDs who, it believes, will have to vote specifically on a Bill to allow the Government to cut the minimum wage.
The congress campaign is expected to highlight that Ernest Blythe went down in history as the man who took a shilling off old age pensioners in the 1920s. It is expected to maintain that same fate “in the halls of infamy” awaits current TDs who vote to take €40 per week from the working poor.
A spokesman for Unite also said yesterday that no proposals had been put forward at present to the Ictu to organise a national strike in protest at the Government’s austerity programme.
Another trade union, the TEEU, last week passed a motion at its biennial conference calling for a campaign of disobedience if the Government did not call a general election.