UNION REACTION:THE GENERAL secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, David Begg, has described the Budget as the most right-wing he has ever experienced.
Speaking at a press conference on the Budget yesterday, he said the measures outlined by the Government would drive the country deeper into recession.
Mr Begg again argued the Government proposals in the Budget were “highly dangerous” and “too brutal and too quick”, as they could cut off any recovery in the economy.
Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan had confirmed in his Budget speech a secondary objective of securing a competitive devaluation of wages right across the economy, he said. This stance put other measures in the Budget into relief, he added.
“If you push wages down right across the economy you come quickly down, with some sectors of industry like hotels and catering very close to the minimum wage. This creates an imperative to reduce the minimum wage. And if you are to reduce the minimum wage, you have to reduce social welfare payments – otherwise it becomes uneconomic for people to work.
“In that context you can see where this is going. What was interesting about the Budget was that it was so explicitly acknowledged in it,” he said.
Mr Begg warned that the requirement that a person on job seeker’s allowance had to take any job offered or lose €50 in benefit payments would effectively result in a race to the bottom, and give “enormous advantages in the labour market to employers to bring down the overall level of wages”.