The Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, has rejected claims by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) that there was no need for a second benchmarking study of public sector pay next year.
In a strong defence of a decision described as "perplexing" by the ESRI, Mr Ahern said it was not unreasonable to plan for a further comparison of pay between public and private sectors five years after the previous exercise.
Mr Ahern claimed it was "unusual" for the ESRI's remarks on benchmarking to have been the main focus of comment on what was a positive report on the State's economic outlook.
However, he said Government, as the employer in the public sector, and the trade union movement "agreed on the need for greater transparency in the next benchmarking exercise".
The operation of the first process would be reviewed to consider how it could be streamlined and improved, he said.
This commitment follows widespread criticism that the technical work comparing the public sector pay with the private sector in the first benchmarking review was never published.
Stating that the benchmarking process was never intended to be a once-off exercise, Mr Ahern said the object of the initiative was to move away permanently from the use of relativities between grades when determining public sector pay.
"It is not too many years ago that the public sector was characterised by endless industrial action, with people striving for better pay and conditions and others seeking to maintain relativities," he said.
"We needed to escape the cycle of leap-frogging claims and I am sure nobody is suggesting we go back to those days."
Mr Ahern's remarks were published in a statement in which he welcomed the recent Exchequer figures, the new national pay deal and a series of major job announcements.
He said such developments vindicated the Government's approach to the economy and noted that the ESRI's latest projections suggested "we can be confident about our future prospects".
Questioning how the agreement to a second benchmarking process should have come as a surprise, Mr Ahern said a further exercise was mooted in the Sustaining Progress pay deal concluded early last year.
"We needed a better way to determine pay beyond whether the group in question could use its industrial muscle. The benchmarking process offers us a way to compare public sector jobs with their counterparts in the private sector, to look at the rate of pay determined by the market."
Mr Ahern said it was important that public sector pay was in line with the market so that the Government could continue to attract high-calibre people into the public service.
