Community employment scheme supervisors accept 5% pay offer

Community employment workers have agreed a deal to end their long-running dispute over pay with about 800 supervisors, assistant supervisors and team leaders across a number of different schemes to receive a 5 per cent increase in two phases over the course of this year.

The deal, which follows talks at the Workplace Relations Commission, also includes a mechanism for the negotiation of future pay increases, something both of the unions involved, Siptu and Fórsa, said is key to agreement having been reached.

“This is a group who provide an essential range of services in their communities, but who haven’t seen a pay improvement in a long time,” said Fórsa’s Tony Martin.

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“Essentially, we have access now to an agreed process on pay that wasn’t there before, and that process is subject to review. These are the kinds of measures that will help us secure improved pay measures into the future.”

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Under the terms of the deal, the staff, who work at Community Employment Schemes, the Job Initiative Scheme, the Rural Social Scheme and Tús, will receive a 3 per cent pay increase from April 1st and a further 2 per cent in November.

For many of them, the unions say, it will be their first pay increase in a decade and their pursuit of it included a number of days of industrial action last year. In a ballot on the terms offered, just over 80 per cent of the workers voted in favour of acceptance.

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“Unfortunately, this deal only applies to community sector workers in organisations funded by the Department of Social Protection,” said Brendan Carr of Siptu. “Community workers in other organisations funded by different government departments and agencies also need a pay increase. We will continue to bring their demands to the Government and will not hesitate to carry out further industrial action to secure pay justice for them.”