There have been three major unofficial stoppages at Iarnrod Eireann in the past year. An official strike on the DART line was averted only narrowly in May.

The price of averting that strike was to defer the July 1st extension of the DART service to Greystones and Malahide. Hopefully it will begin next month.

Iarnrod Eireann management and unions tend to adopt a rather cavalier attitude towards the travelling public, which is surprising in a company dependent on a subvention of over £92 million from the taxpayer. There are direct conflicts between management and the Irish Locomotive Drivers' Association (ILDA) on who is to blame for the latest disruption.

The company says that two senior ILDA members wilfully chose to misunderstand procedures involved in representing members to provoke "wildcat" action, while the ILDA says the company penalised the two people concerned for trying to exercise a long-established right to represent fellow drivers at disciplinary hearings.

On Friday the ILDA executive secretary, Mr Brendan Ogle, was told not to drive a train after he complained of stress because Irish Rail management said he could no longer represent colleagues at disciplinary hearings. Other drivers refused to operate Mr Ogle's train and by early evening services in the midlands had come to a halt.

By 9 p.m. Mr Ogle had received a letter from the company assuring him that he could continue representing colleagues at disciplinary hearings. Normal working resumed immediately.

A similar dispute had arisen in Cork, involving the president of the ILDA, Mr Christy Holbrooke. He had represented another driver 12 days ago at an inquiry into an accident and had been told he would not be paid any wages for the day.

There are conflicting accounts of what happened next. But the upshot was that Mr Holbrooke decided not to work yesterday in protest at his treatment. Other drivers also decided to take the day off because they saw the management's attitude as an attempt to victimise Mr Holbrooke as an ILDA activist.

In an attempt to defuse the situation, the company agreed late last week to pay Mr Holbrooke, but by then it was too late. As a result, over 3,000 travellers in the south-west had to make alternative arrangements.

Iarnrod Eireann denies it was more than coincidence that saw managers in Athlone and Cork decide in the same week to challenge the right of both the ILDA president and its executive secretary to represent drivers. However, the company adds that it has no intention of recognising the ILDA as a bona-fide trade union.

Train drivers already have two unions, SIPTU and the NBRU. Most of the NBRU members are former members of SIPTU. All of the ILDA members are former members of SIPTU or the NBRU. They are an increasingly isolated and disorientated group of workers who, in the face of rapid change in the industry, seek refuge in the organisation that promises to resist that change most doggedly.

The ILDA now has about 120 members, a third of Iarnrod Eireann's drivers. Its growth poses challenges not alone for the company but for the other two unions. Nobody may recognise it, nobody may consult it in the current talks on drivers' pay, and its members will certainly not be balloted on any final offer.

But somehow ILDA members must be brought back into the fold. Either their union must be accepted as a legitimate organisation and brought into the talks, or its militant leadership must be tackled head on. The worst possible scenario would be a repeat of this week's events, when the company first appeared to challenge the ILDA and then retreated.