TRADE UNIONS could probably defeat the Government over its proposals for further public spending cuts but it would be a “pyrrhic victory”, Siptu president Jack O’Connor said.
As unions marked the May Day weekend, Mr O’Connor again urged acceptance of the Croke Park proposals on public sector pay and reform and said it offered the best way to protect services and promote economic recovery.
Clarification of aspects of the complex agreement are expected this week to make it clear that the reforms agreed and how they are conducted are not a licence to “kick people from pillar to post”, he said. But “the balance of advantage rests with acceptance”.
Speaking after a May Day rally in Athy, Co Kildare, Mr O’Connor said he was not able to speculate on an alternative to the Croke Park agrement, but the reality is that the Government has signed up to finding cuts of €2 billion this year and €3 billion in 2012.
He said 2012 might not be as severe in the event of economic recovery.
But the Government would adhere to its targets and “the easiest way to do so is at the expense of the public service and and people who are least likely to kick back”.
That would result in major conflict. If every trade union stepped up to the the mark, the trade unions would probably win, given the Government’s unpopularity, but it would be a “pyrrhic victory” and to the detriment of people most likely to be affected.
Mr O’Connor said the Croke Park proposals afford the public service considerable influence in the partnership process.
The rights of the public and the rights of public servants would be more important than “those whose main aim is to increase profits”.
He said there were trade unionists who believed the current proposals can be rejected without any requirement to engage in industrial conflict as a consequence.
But they did not calculate for the 2011 and 2012 cuts “essential to the fiscal plan that the Government has locked us into with the European Commission”. Even if the unions won, the State still faced the enormous legacy of debt and the need to borrow in the financial markets to maintain essential services.
Opponents said voting for the agreement would amount to the trade union movement “folding up its tent and turning its back on its core function to protect members”.
Brian O’Boyle, of the Sligo Workers Alliance, told a rally in the town the proposals accepted Government can tear up any agreement as and when it chooses.
Some 250 people attended a May Day rally in Dublin at which Phil McFadden, president of the Dublin Council of Trade Unions, said the poor were again bailing out the wealthy and it was the same people who get helped.
Asked about the Croke Park proposals, Mr McFadden said “it’s not a great deal but people have got to look at it seriously” and see that there was very little out there, given the financial situation.
Former British miners’ leader Arthur Scargill also addressed the Dublin rally pointing out that capitalists were now being funded by Chinese bankers.
In his May Day statement, Irish Congress of Trade Unions general secretary David Begg accused the Government of being utterly transfixed with the banking crisis and ignoring the 435,000 unemployed, whose benefits were cut.
There was a “bottomless pit” for senior bankers who caused the mess and the jobless are told to wait in line. For any sense of justice or burden-sharing, the jobs crisis must have equal billing with the banking crisis, he said.
