The Irish Congress of Trade Unions has criticised the Budget for its failure to tackle unemployment and tax corporate profits.
In its formal response to this week's Budget, Ictu said today that in the absence of a jobs stimulus, the Budget would serve only to aggravate the downward economic spiral. Government austerity measures are contracting the economy and embedding debt, it said.
Ictu chief economist Paul Sweeney said the 2 per cent increase in Vat was a crazy measure that would add 1 per cent to inflation and destroy jobs.
He described the lack of a jobs strategy as the biggest disappointment of the Budget and said he was "aghast" at the decision to provide new tax breaks for property developers.
Unless there was a jobs initiative, another 30,000 jobs would be lost, Mr Sweeney predicted. Ireland, there were 40 jobseekers for every available job, he said, which was worse than anywhere else in Europe except Latvia.
"Overall, we're in a very deep crisis and the response in Budget is very, very weak indeed," he said.
According to Mr Sweeney, "the penny hasn't dropped" with the Government on the issue of deflation and next year would see average incomes drop for the fifth year in a row.
Ictu general secretary David Begg said he fundamentally disagreed with the Budget and expressed "huge concern" about its effect on unemployment. He described as worrying the high proportion of long-term unemployed and young unemployed among the overall figures.
It was clear that unemployment would continue to rise, he said.
The fundamental problem with the Budget was that it wasn't going to work, because it would lead to a deflationary downward spiral, he said.
However, he said he accepted that Ireland was not "master of its fate" because it was locked into the terms of the bailout and the "doctrinaire" demands of the EU and the European Central Bank.