BASING itself on comparative developments between 2003 and 2006, the ESRI jumps to the conclusion (December 19) that “public sector rates of pay are no longer sustainable”.

I TOTALLY disagree with the views of Manus O’Riordan (Letters, November 13) on the recent remembrance concert at Cork City Hall.

THE recession will last longer than a year if wages are frozen, researchers from the country’s biggest union warned yesterday.

LOW-PAID workers endured a 0.7% pay cut during the last social partnership agreement, a SIPTU economist said yesterday.

YOUR columnist Diarmaid Ferriter (February 21) has drawn attention to the argument advanced by Niamh Puirséil, historian of the Labour Party, that “social partnership could have become a reality much earlier if Fine Gael had not been so hostile to trade unions when in government in the 1980s”.

MANUS O’RIORDAN and Fr Iggy O’Donovan (Letters, December 24) point out some discrepancies in my letter (December 18) on the Taliban-style destruction of census records prior to 1901. Juxtaposition of the destruction of records during the War of Independence and Civil War, some gremlins and necessary editing of my letter presented the picture as obtained, which was not far removed from actual fact.

EAMON de Valera should not automatically be awarded first prize in every conflict he had with Winston Churchill.

INDEXATION of tax credits and bands would have required the budget to increase them by 5%.

I REFER to the murder on Sunday, June 3, of the Irish-trained Iraqi priest Fr Ragheed Ganni and three of his deacons, after he had celebrated Mass in his native city of Mosul.

IMPLEMENTATION of the latest social partnership agreement could hinge on two meetings being held today by the country’s largest trade union, SIPTU.

THE recent ESRI report on the Freedom of Movement for Workers from Central and Eastern Europe was, to say the least, slim on substance.

Research which claims there is no evidence that wage rates in Ireland are being undermined through the exploitation of foreign nationals is based on seriously flawed data, according to the country’s largest trade union.

I PRESUME when Ryle Dwyer denounces Frank Ryan’s November 1932 slogan ‘no free speech for traitors,’ in his review of a new Ryan biography by Adrian Hoar (Irish Examiner, April 9), it is not to the word ‘traitors’ he is objecting.

UP to 1.5 million people face a further hike in private health insurance costs on foot of Government plans to increase the cost of a private hospital bed by 25%.

Ireland’s inflation rate rose by 0.7% in the weeks following the introduction of the euro, according to figures released by the Central Statistics Office today.