In the next month or so, the Government, trade unions and employers will sit down to hammer out a new national pay deal. The talks will occur against a background of mounting uncertainty about the international economy.
At home here in Ireland, the economy remains robust, with a strong performance by Irish exporters last year. Yet despite the strong underlying fundamentals of the Irish economy, a certain nervousness still pervades public commentary.
In particular, the sharp decline, over a relatively short period, of the domestic house building sector – with its follow-on price drops – has spooked people given the strong contribution construction has made in recent years to economic growth.
Ireland, as one of the most open economies in the world for its size, could not withstand the impact of a US recession. But if one does occur, thankfully recent economic downturns in the US have only lasted for periods of up to nine months.
The Irish and global economy are in a hiatus period pending a full playing-out of America’s economic difficulties, and how global stock markets respond to the continuing debate about how bad the world’s markets will be hit by the bad mortgage phenomenon which was first unleashed first in the States.
So uncertainty abroad and a nervousness about property prices will probably trim back expectations on all sides from the national partnership discussions. Pay restraint will be the order of the day. However, national pay deals and the partnership process have meant a lot more than mere pay deals in recent years.
At the heart of the very successful Irish partnership process, since its inception by Charles Haughey in 1987, has been a wider concern for social issues that affect workers, and the reform of our tax and other systems, to ensure full equity of treatment for the entire workforce.
Workers rights and entitlements, as well as broader social rights, have been enhanced due to these talks and their constant renewal since 1987. Arguably it has been this wider concern with justice issues in society that has had the most impact in terms of the development of Irish life.
In the last programme there was an emphasis on issues caught up with the inward migration Ireland has experienced in recent years. Hopefully there will an even stronger emphasis on practical measures with regard to migration in the new deal, if and when it is struck.
Many of the fears around inward migration have grown from the perceived notion that labour coming from outside Ireland has been undermining wage rates and work practices. This is a real fear, given that migrant labour has in fact acted to moderate the excessive growth of wages in recent years, according to the ESRI, the government’s own research think tank.
In my view, however, migrant labour has been an enormous positive in terms of developing the Irish labour market and has not been, overall, to the detriment of work and conditions. This, though, should not make the social partners, including the Government, complacent when it comes to the protections of workers against exploitation by unscrupuolous employers who prey on migrants’ lack of knowledge about their entitlements.
The new partnership deal must look again at this area and tighten up on the controls and penalties handed down to employers who breach the basis norms of our social contract as it has emerged in recent years.
The exploitation of vulnerable migrant workers has the potential not only to damage the social fabric, but also to pitch indigenous workers against newcomers in a way that, as we have seen in other European countries, creates a long-term and rather poisonous atmosphere of racial tension.
During the past week I had the privilege to launch a new booklet produced by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions in several different languages on the basic entitlements that migrants and non-migrants can access. It is a good leaflet, and for a change quite readable as a guide to the complex maze that the social welfare entitlements scene sometimes presents both to policymakers and public alike.
The leaflet will be given out at all of the Ictu’s partnership centres around the country. It is good to see that bodies like the unions are now moving strongly in defence of migrants and taking into their hearts and minds the issues involved.
Sometimes in other countries, unions have reacted to inward migration out of a sense of fear and loathing. Thankfully our own Irish movement is determined to ensure that this kind of reaction does not define their response to one of the greatest challenges this country will face over the next few years.
Conor Lenihan TD is Minister for Integration and represents the constituency of Dublin South West, which includes Tallaght, Greenhills, Firhouse, Templeogue and Boherna-breena
