Ireland: Unions and employers agree protocol to guide company bargaining

The Irish Business and Employers Confederation (IBEC) and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) signed a protocol in March 2010 aimed at ensuring that company-level collective bargaining is conducted in an orderly fashion during 2010, in the absence of a national pay agreement.

The terms of the 21-month private sector pay deal agreed in September 2008 were not observed by most employers during 2009, as the Irish economy went into deep recession.