Industrial action affecting rail and bus services appeared increasingly likely yesterday, as talks scheduled for next week faced cancellation.
Officials in the Department of Transport are due to meet CIÉ unions on Thursday, January 15th, to resume discussions on the future of the company.
However, a senior union representative, Mr Noel Dowling of SIPTU, said yesterday those talks were unlikely to go ahead. A decision to withdraw from the talks is expected to be made by the CIÉ unions when they meet on Thursday.
They will also consider resuming a campaign of industrial action, which was deferred last year to allow discussions with the Department to take place.
One union at the company, the NBRU, has already indicated that it is likely to restart industrial action within a fortnight. Its national executive meets today to make a decision. The unions are angry over newspaper interviews given by Minister for Transport Mr Brennan in the run-up to Christmas, in which he restated his intention to break up CIÉ and introduce competition from private operators.
Mr Dowling said yesterday that unions had entered talks with the Department on the understanding that matters of policy were not to be discussed.
However the Minister persisted in giving interviews that suggested the policy was already decided, and the discussions were about implementation only.
The unions had no alternative but to conclude that the discussions were being conducted in bad faith, he said.
A spokesman for the Minister said Mr Brennan was asked daily about his policies, and he had a right to outline what they were.Unions were entitled to do the same, and this did not have to conflict with the ongoing negotiations.