Leading trade unionist Peter McLoone is to take over as chairman of State training and employment agency Fás in the New Year.

Mr McLoone is general secretary of the Irish Municipal, Public and Civil Trade Union (Impact) and president of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (Ictu).

He is also a member of the National Competitiveness Council. Mr McLoone will serve a five-year term as chairman of FÁS. He will succeed Brian Geoghegan, former director of economic affairs and research with the Irish Business and Employers' Confederation (Ibec).

The Irish Times reported this week that the Government was likely to appoint a senior trade unionist to the job on the basis that Mr Geoghegan was the second consecutive Ibec director to chair the State body.

Following the Irish Ferries crisis, which recently prompted mass demonstrations in a number of centres around the Republic, the trade union movement had been pushing to get one of its senior figures appointed to the job.

As leader of one of the State's largest public service trade unions, Mr McLoone played a key role in the drive for the benchmarking pay deal for State employees, which added over €1 billion a year to their wages.

Announcing the appointment yesterday, the Minister for Enterprise Trade and Employment, Micheál Martin, thanked Mr Geoghegan for his service over the past five years. He said during that time the Republic enjoyed strong economic and jobs growth, and said Fás had played an important role in this.

The Government will appoint the rest of the Fás board early in the new year. The board includes representatives of employers, trade unionists, the private sector and the Government.

Fás operates training, employment and recruitment programmes.