If next Monday's DART strike goes ahead it will be because of "the naked greed of a very small number of drivers", according to the head of human resources at Iarnrod Eireann, Mr John Keenan.
He told The Irish Times yesterday that some drivers were seeking in excess of £22,000 each to allow the company to reorganise rail services in the Dublin area and train eight new drivers needed to extend the DART to Greystones.
Mr Keenan said expectations for changes in work practices had become unrealistic. Train drivers in Sligo were seeking £25,000 each to accept the company's new proposals for mainline drivers.
However, the SIPTU branch secretary, Mr Tony Tobin, defended the claims. He said "any professional trade unionist will put forward the maximum possible" on behalf of members. He expressed the belief that a DART strike could still be avoided if the company increased the Labour Court award of £8,000 to DART drivers to £11,000.
He also accused the company of breaching its own procedural agreement with the unions by pressing ahead with plans to train new drivers when the unions were prepared to defer strike action.
Mr Keenan pointed out that the Labour Court ruled last June that the company should be allowed to train drivers while compensation was discussed. The recommendation stated that the unions "should now discontinue the coercive action in which they are engaged and lift any interference with training".
Mr Keenan accepts that his comments about DART drivers "isn't the normal language of industrial relations. It's emotive, but it comes at a time when you have to call a spade a spade, and the travelling public is entitled to know what is going on."
Despite some informal behind-the-scenes contacts, the latest exchange makes the prospects for an early resolution of the dispute ever more remote. Some observers will see Mr Keenan's remarks as an attempt by management to pre-empt an early intervention by the Minister for Public Enterprise, Ms O'Rourke, in the dispute.
DART drivers have threatened all-out industrial action from September 6th if the company begins training eight new drivers who have been selected on an aptitude-test basis from other grades. In the past progression to the DART has been through seniority within the driver grades.
Mr Keenan said Iarnrod Eireann repeatedly had deferred the new training programme to try to negotiate a settlement with the unions. However, following the rejection of the Labour Court award of £8,000 to each driver last month, he said "the future of the company depends on making a stand".
"It is the company's fullest intention to proceed with training on September 6th against a background of a Labour Court recommendation to do so, which recognises that the training programme will have absolutely no effect on the working conditions of existing DART drivers."
He called on the drivers and their unions to reconsider their position in the interests of the travelling public.