Simon Harris<\/a> said on RT\u00c9 radio he was hopeful the process could be concluded within \u201ca couple of days\u201d.<\/p>\n\u201cThe talks are now ongoing, but I do believe a resolution is possible here,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Government passionately believes work should always pay. That includes people working in the public service, who are doing excellent jobs in so many vital public services.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to see them get a decent wage. I want to see the pressures that they\u2019re facing addressed, and I also want to see it done in a way that\u2019s obviously sustainable and affordable.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m hopeful that in the coming days we can see a conclusion and a new public sector pay agreement. I\u2019d like to see it done in the next couple of days.\u201d<\/p>\n
The talks are said to have covered a wide range of areas, including pay and productivity. However, sources suggested both sides were sticking to the pre-talks pronouncements that nothing would be agreed until everything was agreed and that several strands were still being worked on.<\/p>\n
The last deal delivered pay increases of at least 9.25 per cent over a 30-month period plus 1 per cent for \u201clocal bargaining\u201d, a process intended to settle outstanding claims in different areas of the civil and public service that proved difficult to implement.<\/p>\n
Some lower-paid workers received increases of up to 17 per cent. Similar flat-rate increases geared towards boosting their pay are again likely to feature this time.<\/p>\n
The new deal is required to provide another 2 per cent for the purpose, which is likely to be paid towards then end of the time period covered by a new deal in order, to allow for the process of claims and their approval to be completed.<\/p>\n
The unions have consistently said they want the talks to address what they see as pay shortfall compared to inflation. They have sought a mechanism to ensure their members are not disadvantaged by any spike in inflation over the next couple of years. <\/p>\n
It is understood, meanwhile, that officials from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform are seeking cooperation with significant measures to boost workplace productivity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Talks on a new national public sector pay deal edged closer to a conclusion on Thursday, but were…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":669354,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1555,61,60,43,70],"class_list":["post-669353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-forsa","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-simon-harris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=669353"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/669353\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/669354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=669353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=669353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=669353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}