IBEC threatens to withdraw from pay agreement

segaBOY

Ibec 'to withdraw' from pay deal
ÉANNA Ó CAOLLAÍ

Employers group Ibec has announced its intention to formally withdraw from the national pay agreement before the end of the year.

A statement issued this evening said the group's national council decided on the move today but insisted it "still supported" an agreed partnership approach to the current economic challenges, but said efforts "must focus on keeping companies in business and supporting jobs."

It threatened to take "unilateral action" if no agreement is reached with Ictu by mid-December on what it described as "an alternative pay agreement that is appropriate for the economic and commercial environment of 2010."

Ibec's director general Danny McCoy said: "Protracted efforts over the last year to reach an agreement on suspending the pay terms have proved unsuccessful. We now owe it to ourselves and to future generations to act decisively and face up to the challenges ahead."

He said the terms of the national pay agreement were agreed in "radically different" economic times describing them now as "utterly inappropriate".

"It would be reckless to attempt to apply those terms in the current circumstances, with so many employers fighting for their very survival," he said.

Warning against increased spending on social welfare, Mr McCoy said Ibec had proposed a set of measures "that would redirect public funds towards keeping people in jobs, rather than allowing a drift into spending equivalent funds on social welfare payments."

He said the country needed to restore confidence insisting that "only competitive businesses can sustain and create employment."

"The business community is willing and able to play its part in getting the country back onto a sustainable path. Pay expectations must however reflect the overriding need to restore competitiveness and protect existing employment", he concluded.

Earlier this month, the Irish Small and Medium Enterprises Association (Isme) called for social partnership to be ditched and for a National Representation Forum to be created instead.

Source: Irish Times

The notion that pay rises should continue to be paid in a period of deflation and dire economic circumstances is absurd. I agree that some form of social partnership needs to exist for the good of society. However, when one side of the table fails to see the levels of crisis a lot of Irish businesses currently find themselves in and instead demand Celtic Tiger style wages and pay rises it is no surprise that this form of action is being contemplated by IBEC.

thebman

What action? Other than walking away what else can they do? Stop payin tax? They'll soon see the consequences.

There is nothing they can do really except wah wah wah like the unions and hope they get their way.

moot

bman, I totally agree. The whole partnership industry is just another variety of quango, whether you are on the employers or unions side it is still an irrelevant waste of money, from a time gone by.