Union warns pay gap could widen

WOMEN workers are increasingly being seen by unscrupulous employers as cheap labour and a means to increase profits, a leading trade union leader warned last night.

SIPTU general secretary Joe O’Flynn also said Irish workers were facing a serious crisis, as ruthless business interests pursued an agenda of maximising profits by driving down labour costs.

“No one is feeling this more than women and ... migrant workers, many of them concentrated in atypical sectors and seen as a source of cheap labour by the most unscrupulous employers,” he told the SIPTU National Women’s Forum in Killarney.