Trade unions to discuss benchmarking

THE trade union movement will meet on February 5/6 to decide whether it will demand the abandonment of the benchmarking process in the wake of Thursday’s pay review which gave nothing to most public sector employees.

A preliminary meeting of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions Public Services Committee yesterday confirmed “the disappointment and dismay” of all the public sector unions, according to committee chair and IMPACT general secretary Peter McLoone.

“The meeting was primarily about getting preliminary feedback from leaders of individual unions on the benchmarking process before they talked to their executives,” he said.

“The report may have damaged the process and has put at risk the confidence people have in this alternative system.

“The leaders have gone off to talk to their executives and we are going to meet on February 5/6 to probably decide the approach we should take in our negotiations with Government on the second module of Towards 2016.”

Mr McLoone said not only the latest benchmarking report but also the 2002 report must be considered.

“After the first one we were the subject of relentless criticism. The public has been lead to believe we have not delivered on themodernisation and change agenda.”

He said there were 300,000 public sector workers covered by the benchmarking report and it took a lot to get support from a group of that size.