ICTU chief warns on policy of growth for growth’s sake

FAILURE to deal with issues of health, housing, the caring infrastructure, upskilling of workers and a less unequal society will eventually undermine Ireland’s economic prosperity, the general secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) warned yesterday.

David Begg, speaking at Mallow Business Breakfast Club in Co Cork, said there is a good prospect of cracking these issues over ten years if a consensus can be achieved.

"This is not a big vision thing. It is a practical approach which would give the concept of the social wage a real meaning. It would reinvigorate social partnership and create in Ireland a reasonably fair society and a decent quality of life," he said.