Vol. 523 No. 1
1095 Mr. Kenny asked the Minister for Education and Science the plans he has to deal with the benchmarking issue as recommended by the arbitration board as soon as possible in view of the secondary teachers pay claim; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20566/00]
The Programme for Prosperity and Fairness provided for the establishment of a public service benchmarking body that would report by the end of 2002. The function of the public service benchmarking body is to arrange in-depth and comprehensive research, examination and analysis of pay levels in the public service and to ground its recommendations in a coherent and broadly based comparison with jobs and pay rates across the economy.
The benchmarking has now been established and the deadline by which the body will report has been brought forward to the end of June, 2002. The agreement with the public services committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions is that the benchmarking body will produce a single report covering all the groups examined. Teachers are one of the key groups that will be examined.
