A chara, - The lack of debate around the adoption of Partnership 2000 is worrying. Despite the fact that a growing number of union executives cannot either endorse it or are recommending a no vote it is time there was more coverage given to the reasons for rejecting Partnership 2000. It is unfortunate that your paper's coverage of this issue has been marred by your correspondents' support for social partnership.
There are a number of reasons why workers should reject Partnership 2000:
1. The meagre pay increases on offer. The basic terms are only 7.4 per cent over 39 months. These are worse than the terms of the PCW and represent a 1 per cent increase after inflation at a time when the economy is booming.
2. In the context of this boom workers are the only people whose incomes are being restrained. There are no limits on profits or the income of the self-employed which have grown more rapidly than the incomes of PAYE workers over the last nine years of social partnership.
3. The deal is being sold on the basis of major changes in taxation. These changes are long overdue and workers should not accept further pay restraint in exchange for them. Further, while the burden of tax on the PAYE sector has been long recognised as a major problem this deal will see tax concessions for employers.
4. Partnership 2000 offers a 14 per cent increase in pay according to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. Given that this includes a 2 per cent local bargaining which workers may not get, ICTU's own figures, which have not been widely circulated show that many workers will get a lot less. For example a married worker with two children and earning £12,000 will get 11.2 per cent. If this worker is in the public sector and paying the lower rate of PRSI the increase amounts to 10.5 per cent.
5. Aspects of the PCW have still not been agreed in the public sector. With a lot of unfinished business it makes no sense for unions to agree to a new deal. It is particularly upsetting as a non-permanent teacher that commitments in the PCW to resolve the casualisation problem within teaching have not been acted on. Indeed Partnership 2000 holds out no hope of halting casualisation in general.
6. The reality of social partnership is quite different to the rhetoric espoused by the ICTU leadership. With a major nurses strike about to start and working conditions under attack in CIE there is not a lot of evidence of social partnership in the public sector. In the private sector employer hostility to unions is rising and a vibrant non-union sector has emerged. While employment has increased by 14 per cent between 1987 and 1995 union membership rose by 6 per cent. Union density fell from 56 per cent to 52 per cent in the same period. The union leaders made union recognition a key issue going into talks, yet have come back with nothing concrete. So much for partnership securing the position of the trade union movement.
As opposition rises to Partnership 2000 a major debate is necessary in the media and within unions. A precondition for such a debate is that union publications be opened to both sides of the debate. This is particularly necessary in SIPTU which with its large membership can determine, almost alone, the fate of Partnership 2000. - Is mise,
Lecturer in General Studies, Industrial Sociology and Industrial Relations, DIT and NCIR, 74 Glenbeigh Road, Dublin 7.