Employers' group Ibec will argue that there is no justification for any public sector pay increases under the next round of benchmarking at a meeting today with the Public Service Benchmarking Body.
Ibec director Brendan McGinty said it currently estimated that public sector workers earned 20 per cent more than equivalent workers in the private sector.
The employers' body is keen that the benchmarking body consider the cost of providing "extraordinarily generous" public service pensions, which it says is equivalent to about 40 per cent of gross earnings compared to 15 per cent in the private sector. Insufficient account was taken of the value of public service pensions and job security in the last round of benchmarking, Ibec will say.
The group is expected to highlight what it describes as major flaws in the last benchmarking round, including a lack of transparency and the timing of process, which it said was carried out at a time when pay and conditions in the private sector were at unsustainable levels.
Additional pay costs incurred by local authorities were directly passed on to businesses in the form of increased local charges for waste, water and rates, according to Ibec.
It also claims that private sector employers had experienced considerable difficulty in competing with public sector employers for staff, particularly in regional areas. "Any repeat of the experience of the first benchmarking exercise will not be acceptable." Mr McGinty said in a statement. "If we drive pay in the economy towards uncompetitive levels, we will undermine the ability of trading companies to provide the exports which ultimately pay Ireland's way in the world.
"For business and the wider public to have any confidence in the process, the next phase of benchmarking must be transparent and the body must justify its findings to the taxpayer."
Last month, the Public Service Benchmarking Body advertised for consultants to examine the employment and pay data collated by the Central Statistics Office in order to compare wages in the public and private sectors.
