The Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) has started a nationwide billboard campaign "for a fair minimum wage". The first of the 200 posters was unveiled yesterday by Ms Esther Flynn, who earns £3.71 per hour as a cleaner at a hospital.
"Those who say that £5 an hour [the proposed minimum wage] is too high should try living on less," she said.
The ICTU general secretary, Mr Peter Cassells, said tens of thousands of low-paid workers expected the report of the National Wage Commission, due in 1998 "to mark the beginning of the end of the scandal of poverty wages."