ILPC 2026

This paper will outline the changed industrial relations landscape of Ireland, recent developments in wage bargaining that has seen the emergence of private sector firm level pay bargaining and the return of bitter industrial disputes. It will also outline how the slow pace of pay restoration in the public sector is acting as a barrier to wage growth in the private sector. The paper discusses the revitalisation of grassroots union activism spurred by firm level bargaining and a changed IR regulatory framework. In the aftermath of the global economic crisis the economy of Ireland suffered immensely. It is now well known that Ireland’s infamous “Celtic Tiger” era ended with the sudden and dramatic collapse of the country’s corporatist model of social partnership amidst neo-liberal pressures (McDonough and Dundon, 2010; Roche, 2011). An IMF paper (Laeven and Valencia, 2012) estimated that Ireland’s banking crisis was one of the most severe in world economic history. The ‘Troika’ bailout package was not just financial but included major reforms with the creation of new employment rights and industrial relations bodies (Regan, 2012) and changes to wage setting mechanisms in key economic sectors (Barnard, 2012). Thereby changing the IR regulatory scene and posing new challenges on the ability of trade unions to effectively defend or advance the interests of their members. In the period 2009- 2011 real earnings fell by 7% which was the largest fall in real earnings since World War 2 in Ireland (CSO, 2015). From 2014 onwards Ireland has witnessed clear signs of economic recovery and the emergence of patterns of increased union militancy in both private and public sectors. Workers have sought restoration of pay and conditions or to obtain ‘catch-up’ pay for forgone potential earnings, although average weekly earnings are broadly unchanged since 2008. Private sector earnings increased have been growing at an average rate of 1.1% over the last five years. The orderly process agreed between the government and most public sector unions to phase out emergency pay legislation is being severely challenged through industrial action within the public sector from teachers, police and transport workers. In the private sector the modest pay rises of 2% have become the norm from 2011 onwards in some sectors but not in others. Sectoral performances have varied and weekly earnings have fallen in the accommodation and food sector (mainly private sector) over the last five years as well as in the education and health sectors (both mainly public sector) (McDonnell, 2016). Irish trade unions participated in a national level social partnership process from 1987-2009 when pay rates across the private and public sectors were agreed on a voluntary basis at national level. Trade union officers have had to relearn old skills of firm level pay bargaining and developing strategic ‘whipsawing’ negotiations in profitable firms, which are fashioned as moral and practical suasion in obtaining pay increases across other firms and sectors. Irish trade unions have seen a revitalisation of firm level membership participation and growing demands for higher pay. The new industrial relations architecture put in place at the behest of the Troika is being challenged by the spread of enterprise level pay demands which are the result of pent-up frustration of many years of cutbacks in real earnings. Irish trade unions have also adapted to new IR laws and have effectively utilised them to achieve pay rises, improvements in conditions in a small number of firms; which are highly significant gains to allow unions organise in previously non-union firms and establish effective collective bargaining mechanisms in them.