Siptu boss: Sides need space to formulate pay deal

Siptu chief Jack O’Connor has said both sides in the public service pay dispute have “painted themselves into corners” and appealed to each to give the other the space to find a “fair resolution”.

Mr O’Connor was speaking after a weekend in which it emerged the Government intends to legislate for pay cuts and freeze increments permanently if no deal is achieved within the next two weeks on cutting the public service wage bill by €300m this year and €1bn by 2015.

If no possibility of a deal emerges in the short term, it is likely the cuts will be introduced ahead of the original July 1 deadline.

Overtime rates and premium payments would also be cut for certain sectors. The straight pay cuts for those earning more than €65,000 would be permanent; Croke Park II had raised the possibility that pay cuts for those earning between €65,000 and €100,000 could be reversed to some degree when the economy improved.

“We are moving to a very dangerous place and people are painting themselves into corners on both sides,” said Mr O’Connor. “There is a need for each side to give the other space if there is to be a fair resolution of the dispute.”

One of the major reasons Mr O’Connor and the Siptu executive recommended its members accept the Croke Park II proposals was because it offered protection against the outsourcing of roles, something which was particularly pertinent for its own members in certain sectors, including health.

If no deal can be achieved and the Government does press ahead with the its own agenda for making the savings, the protection from outsourcing and compulsory redundancies will be gone.

Siptu has yet to meet with Labour Relations Commission chief executive Kieran Mulvey, the man tasked with finding out whether enough common ground exists for a deal.

However, after his union’s meeting with Mr Mulvey last week, Impact general secretary Shay Cody expressed doubt that Mr Mulvey would be able to find enough common ground between unions to formulate a package which would meet the Government’s requirements.

“The trade union movement is going to have to respond to that and the only way we can respond if we are boxed into a corner is through industrial action across the public service,” said one senior trade union source yesterday.

“Both sides have to give ground to create the space for a fair resolution. One side is not going to blink if it knows there is no possibility of reciprocation on the other side.”

The industrial action which would be precipitated by unilateral imposition of cuts would be highly disruptive. It would not only involve unions which had voted to reject Croke Park II, but also the unions that backed the deal and that will now find their members much worse off than they would otherwise have been.