Unions are to seek pay increases of 4 per cent across the private sector from January.

The chairman of the private sector committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions John Douglas said this would be expected to lead to annual minimum increases of €1,000 per year for workers in full-time employment.

Ictu estimates that its affiliate unions represent just under 300,000 private sector workers across all sectors, including finance ,retail, construction (including electrical and engineering), services, manufacturing, media, communications, telecoms, transport and distribution.

The private sector committee of Ictu made the recommendation to its affiliated unions on Tuesday based on economic analysis provided by the trade union-backed Nevin Economic Research Institute.

However, employers described the move by trade unions as “crude opportunism”.

Mr Douglas said unions believed pay claims of 4 per cent in 2017 in the private sector were “fully justified” given the stagnation in wages since 2010 and recent economic indications.

Conditions of employment

He said following the economic crash workers had lost jobs, pay and working hours and had seen their conditions of employment deteriorate in areas such as pensions and sick pay schemes.

“The economy is beginning to grow again. The economic indicators would suggest that inflation will be running at in or around 2 per cent, worker productivity will be over 1½ per cent so we feel fully justified right across the economy in seeking pay increases in the region of 4 per cent.”

Unions affiliated to the congress represent several hundred thousand workers in areas such as construction, retail,banking and manufacturing.

Mr Douglas said unions would enter into reasonable discussions with employers who said they had special circumstances and could not afford to pay increases of 4 per cent.

However, he said in cases where employers could afford to pay but refused to do so, it would be a different matter and union members would have to make decisions around that. He said unions would look at economic data at the end of 2017 to formulate claims for 2018 and beyond.

Director general of the employers’ group Ibec Danny McCoy criticised the move by unions to lodge claims for across-the-board increases of 4 per cent.

Awarding pay increases

“”Enterprise level pay bargaining has been and remains the most appropriate way to determine pay in the private sector, taking account of the competitive and productivity pressures on individual firms. Attempts to hold the country to ransom by collusion between public and private sector unions must be resisted.

“The majority of private sector companies have been awarding pay increases over recent years. There is absolutely no justification for cost of living increases of 2 per cent while the consumer price index remains below 2008 levels, with no emerging inflationary pressures in the economy,” he said.

Mr Douglas denied the decision of unions representing staff in the private sector to seek increases of 4 per cent was influenced by recent pay movements in the public sector . He said there were two separate “spheres” .

“The public sector is doing its own thing based on its [pay] restoration agenda. The private sector is seeking pay increases based on stagnation really in real pay for private sector workers since 2010. So there is an element of catch-up, there is an element of cost-of-living and there is an element of productivity. The private sector has its own data and we will be prosecuting that data.

" We believe employers will pay, we believe employers can afford to pay and we believe they should pay. Workers in Ireland deserve a pay rise."