Vol. 564 No. 2
79 Mr. Sherlock asked the Minister for Defence the position regarding the discussions with the representative organisations regarding the benchmarking report; the allocation which has been made within his Department's Estimates for 2003 to pay the benchmarking award; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8918/03]
First, I welcome the recent endorsement by both employers and unions of the Sustaining Progress national partnership agreement. I believe that this agreement will yield many social benefits and that the pay rises will enhance living standards as the downward pressure on inflation continues. Ireland currently stands at the crossroads between maintaining the huge progress of recent years and seeing the erosion of business and employment; this agreement will also give Irish business the opportunity to restore competitiveness.
As I have informed the House on a number of previous occasions, members of the Defence Forces are prohibited from belonging to trade unions and, as a consequence, their representative associations are not affiliated to ICTU. This means that the associations do not participate directly in the negotiations between the social partners which have led to national agreements. In the course of discussions on the Programme for Prosperity and Fairness, agreement was reached with the Defence Forces representative associations on a framework which would facilitate them engaging with the official side in talks parallel to those taking place between the social partners at national level. Under the terms of this agreement, representatives of the Departments of the Taoiseach, Finance, Defence and the military authorities met collectively and separately with representatives of PDFORRA and RACO. These meetings were supplemented by a number of bilateral meetings involving the various parties. This process ensured that the associations were fully aware of developments at the central discussions while at the same time having a forum to raise matters of particular concern to them.
