These contributions are in addition to the costs of substantial, well-staffed Human Resources Departments. In addition, it should be noted that the State, through the Labour Relations Commission and the Labour Court, provides a free service for the resolution of disputes between employers and employees.

Despite this duplication of costs, whereby universities employ substantial numbers of HR staff and then go on to pay IBEC ‘for advice’, the universities also routinely incur massive legal costs for the hire of lawyers to deal with employees.

“IFUT has expressed serious concern over recent years that universities are using needlessly expensive legal teams to deal with industrial relations matters. Not only does this involve huge avoidable cost to the university – money which could be better used elsewhere – but also, we believe, there is an element of trying to intimidate staff against raising grievances even of a relatively simple nature”, said Mike Jennings, IFUT General Secretary.

The IFUT Press Release is available in full here. The fees paid by the Universities to IBEC are available here.

The leadership of the unions is determined to reflect the anger of teachers at the budget cuts to salaries and changes to pensions through a sustained campaign of opposition.

The four unions said the unilateral imposition of a pay cut in the budget was completely incompatible with social partnership, which in the view of the four teacher unions is now over.

All of the unions categorically rejected out of hand any suggestion that talks on a transformation agenda could continue. The unions said Government had its chance to talk last week but spurned the opportunity. “Those talks are over,” said a spokesperson. “They will not be restarted.”

The joint Press Release is available in full here.

“If they cut our pay, they can hardly expect us to continue working as though nothing had happened. I expect that IFUT members will disengage from non-core duties, particularly in the administrative area”, said Mike Jennings, General Secretary.

IFUT will also re-ballot its members to take part in any national or education sector-wide strikes in opposition to a pay cut for these members.

“At a time when there are more students than ever before in Higher Education, a combination of the drastic understaffing caused by the misguided staffing embargo and the collapse of morale caused by the cut of pay seems guaranteed to do untold damage to the education system just when so many more people need it”, said Mr. Jennings, who was speaking following a meeting of the National Executive at the weekend.

The IFUT Press Release is available in full here.

The General Secretaries and Presidents of the four Teacher Unions issued a Joint Statement after their meeting today (Tuesday, 22 September 2009). “We want to send a crystal clear message to An Taoiseach and his Ministers that we will not accept the scape-goating of our members to pay for a financial crisis which we did not cause.

“Teachers and lecturers have already suffered a severe drop in living standards. If more pain is necessary, it must be spread fairly and evenly over those who can most afford it. Singling out public servants for special treatment is nothing more than an ill-thought out recipe for social division.”

The Press Release is available in full here.

All four unions are gravely concerned that cutbacks already in place are having a detrimental effect on the education system. Staffing and other cutbacks at primary, post-primary and third-level are severely damaging the education system and the country is at risk of suffering a sharp fall in educational standards if the sector is further targeted.

The unions are committed to maintaining the highest standards within the education system, particularly for the disadvantaged in the communities in which members work.

As trade unions, there is also concern for the security of tenure and conditions of service of teachers and lecturers.

The Press Release is available in full here.

IFUT General Secretary, Mike Jennings, said that IFUT wanted complete transparency in the payment of allowances and was critical of those allowances which were not directly linked to the performance of extra duties. However, he was clear that with regard to those “legitimate” allowances that were paid to staff for taking on additional workloads, IFUT members would not be performing such role if they were not paid the allowance.

The full article from Industrial Relations News (Issue 30, 27 August 2009) is available here.

The General Secretary, Mike Jennings, has written to all members with an update. The General Secretary’s letter is available here (Members only).

The General Secretary, Mike Jennings, said that the ballot represents “the reluctant determination of IFUT members to register the strongest possible protest against the Government’s handling of the economic crisis”.

The ballot was counted today and showed a margin of 67.7% in favour of the action.

The IFUT Press Release is available here.