Rail staff donate pay to charity

A group of Irish Rail workers who received €25,000 in a pay settlement with the company are to donate the entire sum to charity.

The workers, engineering operatives represented by SIPTU, had been in pay and productivity negotiations with Iarnród Éireann, which included an issue of payments in arrears amounting to €25,000.

There are approximately 250 people in the grade, and the arrears payments each individual would have received were modest, according to the company.

The negotiating team, on behalf of the workers, supported pooling the money for a charity donation. A spokesman for Iarnród Éireann stressed that the donation comes from the workers and not the company.

The workers, based in Inchicore, Portlaoise and fleet maintenance facilities across the country, selected five charities to benefit from donations of €5,000 each.

They were the Irish Cancer Society; the Multiple Sclerosis Society; Laois Hospice Foundation; Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children, Crumlin and the Autistic Society, Dunfert.

The SIPTU-represented engineering operatives, whose duties cover support for craftspeople and electrician to maintain the fleet, and duties in sleeper production, were conducting pay and productivity negotiations for the grade, which included an issue of payments due in arrears. There are approximately 250 people in the grade, in Inchicore, Portlaoise, and fleet maintenance facilities.

Mr John Keenan, Iarnród Éireann's human resources manager, said "the money donated is not an Iarnród Éireann donation - it is money that was earned by our colleagues in the engineering operatives grades, and donated by them to these great causes. Too often we hear the negative about industrial relations matters; this initiative is positive and imaginative, for which I commend our colleagues and their union SIPTU."