'There's a strange sort of febrile atmosphere in the country at the moment'

THEY look a bit alike (neat beards, spectacles and serious faces), they are certainly singing from the same song-sheet, they even finish each others' sentences and the country is deeply divided into either love 'em or loathe 'em camps.

But they're not so much the Grimes Twins as the Grim Twins, ICTU's President Jack O'Connor and General Secretary David Begg -- collectively known as Javid.

And yesterday, in the headquarters of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions on Parnell Square, Javid were reprising a medley of their favourite hits, all based on a single familiar theme -- 'Paws Off Public Sector Pay'.

Under the Bob Marley-inspired slogan, Get Up Stand Up, the chaps were indulging in a bit of recession reggae. They have a 10-point plan, which they declare to be 'a better, fairer way' to tackle the ever-expanding black hole in the national finances, and were eager to rush-release it five weeks before the Budget.

The trouble is that there isn't much harmony these days between the Government, who are committed to cutting €4bn in spending in the December 9 horror show, including €1.3bn in public sector pay, and the various trade unions who are adamant that the money must be raised another way.

These serious artistic differences caused a major rift in the social partnership earlier this year, and this document is essentially the last pre-Budget throw of the dice before a rolling series of protests, beginning with ICTU's Day of Action this Friday.

And so yesterday the two men presented their alternative recovery plan, which rules out social welfare reductions and warns that pay cuts -- or even the less evil-sounding "wage moderation" -- will trigger deflation.

But the plan also has some suggestions, such as finding €1bn to set up a jobs promotion fund and introducing a third tax band for whatever remains of the wealthy -- David Begg proposed it would have to be above 54pc.

ICTU reckon that more money can be borrowed, and take a severe view of a mysterious cabal -- whom the document dubs the 'Hard Jocks' -- who are opposed to borrowing another red cent from anyone. These devils "want to inflict immediate and sudden pain on the Irish economy and society". But Hard Jocks aside, Javid were doing their best to present the ICTU document as a more humane approach than the Government's slash-'n'-burn scheme. "It's not that you can avoid pain, you can't. But it is necessary to try to handle it in a way in which the pain is tolerable," said Jack O'Connor.

David Begg also had his reasonable face on while he defended the planned protests. The trouble was that the denizens of Government Buildings won't play ball. "We tried to have that dialogue with the Government and it didn't succeed. You don't have a choice -- if the Government invites you in to talk you have to actually try to do your best to articulate your point of view," he explained.

AND David also refused to get stuck into Brian Lenihan for his recent snide remark that the trade union brass "want to tax everyone else to have higher salaries for themselves".

"On what the Minister for Finance said about our motives, I think that in a situation like this you can't afford to start worrying too much about what people say on issues like this," said David. "Everyone's very tense and there's a strange sort of febrile atmosphere in the country at the moment and you have to allow for that," he added philosophically.

But with more pow-wows yet to come with the Government, the two men were keen to point out that ICTU wasn't actually leading the charge to the barricades. ICTU was merely the "overarching body," explained David. "What positions have been made by the individual unions on industrial action have been made by them, not by the Congress," he stated.

Javid were doing their best to sing soothing songs, but could it be coincidence that the press conference was interrupted by a loud mobile phone emitting a soundtrack from the gory 'Kill Bill' flick. Ominously, it was the tune whistled by Daryl Hannah -- who played a violent, homicidal nurse. Uh-oh.

- Lise Hand

Irish Independent