PAYE workers are being "ripped off" by the Government and employers in the Programme Competitiveness and Work, SIPTU vice president, Jimmy Somers, said.
On Thursday the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, Mr Bruton, warned that even greater pay restraint would be required from the trade union movement in national agreements. Otherwise, he said, job creation and tax reforms would be at risk.
Mr Somers, at a meeting in Galway last night, said: "Huge profits have been generated as a result of the PCW. However, workers have not benefited proportionately." Employers had been "over zealous" in policing the PCW and had failed "to translate the spirit of the deal in, any way to the shop floor".
Employers "have in reality spent much of the past three years undermining whatever confidence workers have had in such deals. Equally the Government, as social partners, ignored the clearest warnings from union leaders that unless they delivered on the tax elements of the deal in the Budget, including reversing the unwarranted taxing of unemployment and disability benefits, they would create circumstances which would make it extremely difficult to successfully negotiate any new deal."
Considering the scale of economic growth "it beggars belief among union leaders and members alike that their social partners would rip off the already grossly overburdened PAYE sector in such a cavalier fashion".
Meanwhile, the Irish Business and Employers Confederation has welcomed Mr Bruton's approach to employment. In a statement yesterday it welcomed the Government's analysis contained in its report Growing and Sharing Our Employment, issued on Thursday. Competitiveness had to be the key to policy, especially in the context of preparations for EMU.