The vice-chairman of the ESB and its senior worker director, Mr Joe LaCumbre, has made a strong appeal to the company's unions not to take strike action.
Commenting to The Irish Times on the threatened strike action by SIPTU and the ESB Officers' Association, Mr LaCumbre said yesterday: "I don't believe the current difficulties in the company have to be, or can only be, resolved by way of strike action.
"There are indeed very serious tensions and frustrations building up which are directly related to the unresolved radical restructuring proposals of the company, but the facts are that the trade unions have accepted the broad principle of the necessity of restructuring to deal with the impact of deregulation."
Next week, ESB union officials are expected to try to reach a strategy for securing maximum pay increases in return for restructuring. If they fail, there is a strong likelihood that negotiations will fragment and degenerate into a series of strikes over "catch-up" claims.
"The record to date on restructuring is testimony to the very positive approach of our trade unions", Mr LaCumbre said. "Since the mid-1980s ESB manning levels have been reduced by almost 50 per cent . . . to 7,000."
Further job cuts of 2,000 are being sought, along with the closure of at least six power stations and a review of operations from retail outlets to distribution and power-generation. Network technicians have already rejected pay rises worth up to 18.5 per cent. SIPTU and the ESBOA are now seeking rises of 28 per cent.
Mr LaCumbre believes "the delivery this week in the Dail" of the 5 per cent shareholding for employees by the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, was "hugely important" for improving the industrial-relations atmosphere.
The priority the new chairman, Mr Tadgh O'Donoghue, was giving to industrial relations and the common interest management and unions had in meeting "the threat and challenge of deregulation" meant "an innovative agreement has to be achieved without recourse to any dispute or strikes".