Partners bid to end pay deal impasse

A BREAK in the deadlock holding up agreement on a new national pay deal is hoped for today as all sides gear up to resume their marathon negotiations.

Pensions and social issues remain outstanding obstacles to a settlement.

Negotiations have already lasted longer than any other agreement talks and prompted Taoiseach Bertie Ahern to despair that it was not very “bright” to take five months to agree a deal which would last less than three years.

Despite a major push to break the impasse at the weekend, talks at Government Buildings broke up late on Saturday night without agreement between the social partners.

Unions are believed to be holding out for pension concessions.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) wants an independent monitor to assess whether companies should be able to close defined-benefit schemes.

Employers’ body IBEC is resisting the move as it says such schemes can often drive smaller firms to the brink of bankruptcy. The stand-off emerged after a wave of top firms sought to close defined-benefit pension schemes to new employees, citing costs.

Union leaders acknowledged that the drawn-out negotiations to achieve a 10% pay rise over 27 months had left little time for contentious social issues to be addressed.

Fr Sean Healy of the CORI Justice Commission said he believed the community and voluntary pillar had managed to use its leverage in the talks.

However, Fr Healy said they would not sign off on any deal that lacked commitment on social housing, welfare and other community issues and he believed there was still a long way to go on getting the balance right.

Partnership talks began in early February but have been hampered by efforts to underpin employment standards. Significant differences between employers and unions have also emerged.

It had been hoped all strands of the negotiations, except farming, would have been sorted out at the weekend. Negotiations should have begun last November but were delayed by the fallout from the Irish Ferries crisis. If the deal goes through, payment dates will vary but the first public sector increase would come into effect on July 1.

A raft of public service reforms have already been agreed in the talks to find a replacement for Sustaining Progress, including lifting the ban on outsourcing “core work”. The issue came to a head last March when Transport Minister Martin Cullen moved to outsource 40,000 driving tests to cut waiting times.