Strike threat at Independent Media

INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPERS faces the prospect of an all-out strike within days after clerical staff last night agreed to ballot for industrial action in response to the company's severance programme.

Trade union SIPTU, which represents most of the workers affected, has also lodged an application for an all-out picket with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. The National Union of Journalists will also ballot members this week in a move that could see journalists at the Irish Independent, Evening Herald and Sunday Independent strike in support of their SIPTU colleagues.

Workers and SIPTU officials accused the company of breaking an agreement that 205 redundancies, which had been sought by Independent Media as part of a restructuring programme, would be on a voluntary basis. Independent Media said last week that workers who failed to sign up for the €23 million voluntary package before May 21 would be made redundant and would only receive their statutory entitlements.