Public sector pay commission ‘will have no power,’ says ASTI

The president of the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI) has said he is "very sceptical" about the proposed public sector pay commission.

The Government hopes the commission will go some way towards easing demands by State employees for pay increases.

Under its expected terms of reference, the commission will look at the evolution of pay trends and make comparisons between public and private sectors, where possible.

“It will report and make recommendations but it will have no power,” ASTI president Ed Byrne said.

He also said that the Government has not indicated what it is going to do in the long-term about pay inequalities.

Members of ASTI are due to hold the first of seven one-day strikes on Thursday. The dispute centres on pay for recently-recruited teachers, and on supervision and substitution payments.

He added that there is a large gap between both sides going into today’s talks talks on pay and conditions, but that ASTI will see if they can bridge that divide.

"We have campaigned for equal pay for equal work. Neither the Government nor Fianna Fáil has supported us in that bid. The first step would be if someone said that they believe in equal pay for equal work."

Mr Byrne pointed out that the Lansdowne Road Agreement “said not one word about new entrants. It was the forgotten issue.”

He rejected the suggestion that the ASTI wanted a “special favour”.

"We never suggested that it should be only us," he told RTÉ's Morning Ireland.

Mr Byrne said that other trade unions had not suffered as much as teachers because of the moratorium on recruitment.

“They took on teachers because they had to, but they were paid less and have been treated like second class citizens,” he said.