Minister for Public Expenditure Brendan Howlin said he was not in a position to predict when the talks on reversing public service pay cuts would conclude.

He said an early agreement would facilitate the assignment of resources and better budgetary planning.

“I have stated previously that both sides need to be realistic in terms of the expectations and outcomes of the talks regarding what can be achieved in the coming weeks,’’ he said.

Fianna Fáil public expenditure spokesman Seán Fleming said the Minister must be going into the talks with some overall objective.

“The Minister will agree that every family has suffered financially in the past eight years and all families in Ireland, both in the public and private sectors, are entitled to share in any improvement in the economy,’’ Mr Fleming said.

“He will also agree the initial focus should be on low and middle-income earners.’’

Mr Fleming said there was room in the public sector area for improvements in pay through not just pay rate adjustments but also reductions in the public pension levy, the USC and various other taxes.

It was important that any discussions took place in the context that every household had contributed and that any pay increases in the public sector should be in line with increases in the private sector, he added.

Mr Howlin said the legislation underpinning the cuts was anchored in the emergency but Ireland was now exiting from it.

“The prudent and right approach is to prepare for the exit in an orderly way but in a way that does not risk the recovery that the Irish people have worked so hard to achieve,’’ he said.

He agreed there was a need to share in the improvement and that was why, during the discussions last year, the process of reducing the universal social charge was begun.