Union members were urged yesterday to give up a half-day's work to join a march in Dublin next Thursday in support of workers at Irish Ferries.
The Dublin Council of Trade Unions (DCTU) said members of its 27 affiliated unions should take part in the march to Dáil Éireann, which begins at Liberty Hall at 2pm.
Irish Ferries is seeking to lay off hundreds of unionised seafarers and replace them with cheaper labour from eastern Europe. A threatened strike over the issue was averted earlier this month following an intervention by the Labour Court.
However, talks between the company and Siptu since then have not been successful and the matter is to be referred back to the court for hearing early next month.
DCTU president Arthur Hall said the issue of jobs displacement affected every worker in the country. He said the Government had consistently failed to enforce labour laws and had turned a "blind eye" to the "growing level" of exploitation of migrant workers.
"Only the trade union movement can stop this race to the bottom," he said.
