The Government has been urged to take more targeted action to address the impact of rising inflation on workers, the unemployed and more marginalised members of society.<\/p>\n
Irish Congress of Trade Unions<\/a> (Ictu) general secretary Owen Reidy said it was \u201ctragic\u201d that a \u201ccrazy military escapade\u201d could potentially cause another cost-of-living crisis. <\/p>\n However, he said that if heightened inflation persisted then it would inevitably lead to increased pay claims from workers across the economy. <\/p>\n The Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP), published on Monday, indicated that prices increased at an annualised rate of 3.6 per cent<\/a> in March, up from 2.5 per cent the month before. <\/p>\n Fuel, the price of which has increased sharply since the start of the US<\/a> and Israeli<\/a> war on Iran<\/a>, was the driving force behind the rise, with the price of food falling fractionally last month after sustained increases.<\/p>\n \u201cHopefully this will only be a spike and in time we\u2019ll see it kind of flatten and come down, but it will feed into pay,\u201d Reidy said. <\/p>\n Ictu\u2019s advice to private-sector unions, he said, had been to seek pay rises of up to 6 per cent based on factors including inflation of about 2.5 per cent. <\/p>\n This advice could be revised upwards in light of events in the Gulf and Middle East, Reidy said, with Ictu planning to monitor the situation over the coming months. <\/p>\n The position of unions going into talks in the coming months on the possibility of a new public-sector pay deal, which would affect more than 400,000 workers, would be influenced by what happened with inflation.<\/p>\n Donal Swan, senior policy coordinator at the National Women\u2019s Council, was also frustrated about the cause of the present round of price increases, saying many people were still struggling with aspects of the fallout from the war in Ukraine<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThese crises … don\u2019t really affect everyone equally. They tend to exacerbate existing inequalities,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cWomen are particularly affected at a broad level because of their lower incomes, wealth, access to services. And marginalised women like lone parents, disabled women, Traveller women or migrant women are particularly impacted. There is this feeling for them, I think, that it\u2019s all happening again.\u201d<\/p>\n Structural reforms that might provide some buffers against the impact of future shocks to the economy were required, he said, but more immediately \u201cwhat we\u2019ve consistently said is that targeting is really important \u2026 targeting the vulnerable and marginalised communities has to be the approach taken\u201d.<\/p>\n