Workers braced for day of protest

Workers across the country were tonight preparing for a mass protest against the Government’s planned pay and spending cuts.

Thousands of public and private sector employees are taking to the streets of eight major towns and cities tomorrow for a series of regional rallies.

In a speech in Dublin, Taoiseach Brian Cowen said: "There has to be a contribution made from the public sector pay and pension bill, as there will have to be made from every area every of public expenditure".

And ahead of tomorrow's protests on the streets, the Taoiseach acknowledged that while it was a democratic right to protest: "We have to get on with coming up with the solutions based on the reality as it is – not how we’d like it to be".

Union chiefs warned there could be strikes within weeks if calls made at the National Day of Action were ignored.

Peter McLoone, general secretary of the country’s largest public sector union Impact, said his members were protesting after several months of unsuccessful talks.

“The people that we represent now want to give vent to their anger and their frustration and that’s why they are taking to the streets,” he said.

“In the meantime we continue our efforts to try to find a solution that will avoid the protest escalating into strikes later in the month.”

The demonstrations are part of an Irish Congress of Trade Unions campaign opposing high unemployment, pay cuts and spending reductions.

A further 10 smaller rallies are planned in the North.

Congress general secretary David Begg said he hoped the protests would prevent potential cuts of €4bn in the December Budget.

“The situation is very bad but our feeling is that if the Government goes with this crash programme it could do a lot of damage,” he said.

“It will have a huge deflationary shock effect on the economy, making unemployment much worse and the lives of people much worse.

“We’re recommending that the adjustment is made over a longer period of time and in the course of doing that we preserve the fabric of society.”

The umbrella group said its campaign – There is Still a Better, Fairer Way - will run at least until the day of Budget 2010 in December and possibly beyond.

This afternoon unions returned to the talks table with Government.