Government urged to act on widening pay gap

The Government has been urged to do more to close the gap between pay levels in the public and private sectors, which is widening according to latest CSO data.

New preliminary quarterly earnings and labour cost figures, published yesterday by the CSO, show that average weekly earnings, across both sectors combined, grew by 2.2%, year-on-year, in the three months to the end of June, to €722.65. Final CSO data for the first quarter of the year show a 1.5% annualised rise in average weekly earnings to €724.44.

The provisional figures for the second quarter show a 2.4% year-on-year jump in average earnings for the public sector to €938.25 per week. There was also an annualised increase for average weekly earnings in the private sector, of 1.9%, to €660.99.