Ahern defends planned benchmarking round two

TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern yesterday defended the planned second benchmarking round, saying it was an appropriate way of determining public sector pay rises into the future.

Mr Ahern's comments came after the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) this week criticised the second round of benchmarking and produced research indicating that public sector workers were already paid 13% more than private sector workers even before the last benchmarking round.

However, in a statement released yesterday, Mr Ahern said the next benchmarking round would account for pay differences in the coming years.