ANY new national wage agreement should include an anti-poverty strategy and tax reforms to tackle unemployment, if the economic boom is to be sustained.
These are the main recommendations of a report by the National Economic and Social Forum (NESF) published yesterday.
However, the Fianna Fail spokeswoman on enterprise and employment, Ms Mary O'Rourke, complained that the forum was being marginalised by the Government. "This Government is not giving NESF reports the consideration they deserve. The Labour Party, in particular, are treating the NESF with absolute contempt.
Ms O'Rourke said she would be telling her front bench that Fianna Fail's political support for any national agreement should be "very much tempered by whatever we see on offer on long term unemployment.
At the publication of the report, Post PCW Negotiations A new Deal?, the chairwoman, Ms Maureen Gaffney, said the issues of social exclusion and unemployment should be priorities in a new agreement.
In particular, the "cul de sac" of chronic long term unemployment had to be addressed. Long term unemployment now accounts for 48 per cent of total unemployment, she said, and had increased by 49 per cent since 1990.
Not only was it difficult in the immediate future for the people and families involved, but the trend would produce three and four generations of unemployed families.
In a statement, the Government welcomed the report and said it was "anxious to ensure that any future talks are as inclusive as possible and will take full account of the views of the forum in progressing the matter".
The Programme for Competitiveness and Work (PCW), in place since 1994, will finish at the end of the year.
The report recommends income-tax reductions "related to moderate pay settlements" and bringing tax and PRSI rates more in line with Britain. There has already been tension between the Departments of Enterprise and Employment and the Department of Social Welfare on levels of employer and employee PRSI.
Ms Gaffney said the report had "identified the measures that we think would be appropriate in terms of job creation". Local employment services were a key element in any strategy against long-term unemployment.
The forum also addressed the issue of including groups representing the unemployed and marginalised in talks on a new agreement. The main social partners favoured a consultation role for these groups, she said. "But, in very trenchant terms, these groups said it was a waste of time."
Ms Gaffney said the employers' body, IBEC, was strongly opposed to allowing marginal groups join negotiators at the table because single issue groups would not be able to see "the bigger picture".
She said both IBEC and the ICTU now saw the 49 member forum as a mechanism to extend social partnership. However, the problem of long-term unemployment could only be tackled if the Government identified it as serious and "committed themselves to doing something about it".
The forum also expressed "unanimous dissatisfaction about the monitoring and reviewing of national agreements", Ms Gaffney said. "It's not just a question of making the agreement. It's also a question of following through on it."
