Members to grill IMPACT on why it backed pay deal
The first full day of IMPACT’s conference will begin with the union’s outgoing general secretary Peter McLoone outlining his senior role in the negotiation of the deal with the Government, as well as the reasons why, now that clarifications have been secured, he and his executive are recommending acceptance.
Last night, while opening the conference, the union’s president John Power said the deal represented “the best and safest port available to the ‘Good Ship Public Service’ in a raging economic storm”.
However, the timbre of a number of motions which will be heard later in the morning show some members are not convinced the union was proactive enough in preventing the pay cuts referred to in the Croke Park terms.
In one motion from the union’s Clare branch, IMPACT’s response to last April’s pension levy and last December’s budgetary pay cuts are described as “cautious and ineffective”.
The same motion, mirrored by a number of others, claims IMPACT members are “becoming disillusioned with their union and questioning if IMPACT is capable of representing their interests”. It says work-to-rule has been ineffective and that the union’s aims will only be achieved if the public are disrupted by firstly half and then full strikes. A number of other branches also call for an escalation.
Another motion demands that, while the Croke Park deal says priority will be given to the restoration of pay scales for members earning less than €35,000, IMPACT should insist anyone earning less than €50,000 should have their scales restored immediately.
Others insist the transformation of the public service, which the Government is demanding in exchange for guarantees of no pay cuts before 2014, should not be negotiated before all previous pay cuts are reversed.
A joint motion from the Clare and Tipperary branches calls for the public service recruitment moratorium to be withdrawn and, if not, for it to apply to the replacement of Dáil TDs and government ministers.
Among the many other motions are those calling for union subscriptions to be cut in the face of members’ “increased financial difficulties in this recession” and for the union to do its banking with organisations which have a more customer friendly attitude to home repossessions.
The union members will also acknowledge the service Donegal man Peter McLoone has given as leader to the union over the last 14 years. The 700 delegates, who represent 65,000 members, will also be addressed by ICTU general secretary David Begg.
