SIPTU TEAC Division Organiser, Greg Ennis, has declared that Iarnród Éireann is the “new frontline” in the battle to ensure the adequate funding of public transport in Ireland at the union’s Biennial Delegate Conference in Cork today (Thursday, 5th October). Addressing the conference in Cork City Hall, Greg Ennis, said: “Iarnród Éireann is now the new frontline for our public transport service. Employees, who after almost ten years of a pay freeze, can no longer be expected to subsidise this public transport service. Enough is enough – and like the recent disputes in the LUAS, Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann, SIPTU will not be found wanting in fully supporting our 1900 members in Iarnród Éireann in their pursuit of a long overdue pay increase." He added that SIPTU members would “vehemently campaign to oppose” the deliberate underfunding of public transport “which is simply designed to manufacture a false environment to justify privatisation, be it in aviation or transport.” Greg Ennis also criticised a proposal to remove “financial sustainability” from the issues that can be considered in determinations by the Commission for Aviation Regulation. He said that this would leave the Dublin Airport Authority “exposed to the profiteering of a certain airline, who in recent weeks has shown its true colours in its disloyalty to its employees and customers in its insatiable quest for increased profits on the backs of poorly paid aviation workers.” Following the address by Ennis, conference delegates voted unanimously to back a motion reaffirming “the union’s commitment to prevent and/or limit the extent to which public transport becomes privatised”.
SIPTU declares Iarnród Éireann the new frontline in the battle to protect public transport
