‘We are at a crossroads with the cost-of-living crisis’

Secretary Kevin Callinan 700 delegates attending the Fórsa event in the Gleneagle-INEC, Killarney this Thursday.
Picture: Domnick Walsh

The absence of agreement between unions, Government and employer representatives on practical measures to expand the range of free and affordable public services is undermining the national response to Ireland’s cost of living crisis, a major conference in Killarney has been told.

Over 700 delegates attending the Fórsa event in the Gleneagle-INEC, general secretary Kevin Callinan said Ireland should resist a return to the poor quality social dialogue in place prior to the pandemic, during which more intense engagements shaped and delivered workplace safety protocols and emergency income supports.

Speaking at the 80,000-strong union’s national conference, he called for intensified dialogue to improve Ireland’s social wage or state spending on welfare supports and public services. Mr Callinan also called for the national minimum wage to be increased to the rate of the higher living wage.

“We are at a crossroads. The cost-of-living crisis demands more than a talking shop if living standards are to be protected. With the World Bank predicting that energy and commodity prices will remain historically high until 2024, the value of Irish social dialogue will be measured by outcomes, not the number of meetings scheduled,’ the union chief stated.

Kevin Callinan: The cost-of-living crisis demands more than a talking shop if living standards are to be protected”

He said workers in countries across the continent are paying more for heating, fuel and food but in Germany, Denmark, Sweden and most other rich EU nations, workers don’t have to fret about the cost of childcare, an unavoidable visit to the GP or accident and emergency, eldercare fees, or even the rent because they are free or affordable through a public service-delivered social wage.

Mr Callinan said the lack of an adequate social wage was placing all the emphasis on pay as a means of protecting living standards.

Moving a motion from the union’s national executive, which placed the restoration and improvement of living standards above all other issues in the current round of pay bargaining in the public service and elsewhere, Mr Callinan said Fórsa would pursue this with a single-minded determination.

He said he didn’t underestimate the scale of the challenge in the run-up to imminent public service pay talks but he added that there was now a solid basis for substantial negotiations as the employers’ side had acknowledged that the inflation assumptions underpinning Building Momentum have changed significantly.

“Workers, their families and their communities are the victims of inflation, not the cause of inflation. I have made it clear that there needs to be an improvement in the agreement’s pay terms this year,” he said.

Cllr Niall Kelleher welcomed delegates to the conference
Kerry County Council Director of Services John Breen

700 delegates are attending its national conference in Killarney which opened yesterday and continues until tomorrow.

Fóras members work in local government and the civil service and State agencies with many more working in health and education.

The opening gathering was addressed last night by Cllr Niall Kelleher, representing the Mayor of Kerry and the Mayor of Killarney as well as Kerry County Council Director of Services John Breen.

Cllr Kelleher said the union its members were very much to the forefront of helping to keep Ireland open during the  pandemic and everybody is grateful for the wonderful effort they made and the utter dedication with which they set about their duties in very taxing circumstances.

This week’s gathering is Fórsa’s first in-person national conference since before the pandemic.

KillarneyToday.com: Local news when it happens. To advertise call 087-2229761 or email news@killarneytoday.com