Isme seeks wage, recruitment freeze for public sector

Business representative organisation Isme today called for a one-year wage freeze and a two-year recruitment ban for public servants.

In its pre-Budget submission Isme also called on the Minister for Finance not to impose "indirect and stealth" taxes and said the Government should attempt to borrow its way out of the recession.

Isme chief executive Mark Fielding said businesses could not be expected to make up for a fall in the Government contribution to local authorities' budgets with increases in commercial rates.

"Any increases in these areas will be unsustainable. While business continues to pay its fair share, we take serious issue with constantly having to make up the shortfall in local authority budgets, brought about by central Government cutbacks", he said.

Fielding said while there was acceptance that the Budget would contain an element if borrowing, short-term measures could not be imposed to the detriment of the longer-term.

"Businesses, particularly smaller businesses, require a steady hand on the tiller to provide them with the assurances and incentives to both develop and grow their businesses and not just to remain static as is happening to many businesses at present," Fielding said.

He said whatever spending cuts were decided on the infrastructure "bottle-neck" was causing problems for Irish businesses and unless this was addressed, could threaten any future economic growth prospects.

"With sharp reductions in exchequer finances, the temptation is to cut back on capital expenditure and to reduce allocated expenditure for key infrastructure and cancel other major projects".

According to Mr Fielding, this would be a mistake and would further damage the economy.