SIPTU President Jack O'Connor has warned that his union will not recommend any potential public sector pay deal containing proposals to loosen the rules governing the outsourcing of public services.
At present, when calculating the relative merits of outsourcing a public service function, labour costs cannot be factored in.
However, this week the Government tabled a proposal to dilute the rules so that the cost of labour could be considered.
Unions have pledged to resist any such dilution, saying it would open the way to a race to the bottom on pay and conditions.
Mr O'Connor stated categorically that SIPTU will not be recommending any proposal that deletes the provision that excludes consideration of the price of labour in any decision as to whether work should be in-sourced or outsourced.
He said it was a mechanism to limit the degree to which what he called the race to the bottom can be introduced in publicly funded work.
A number of union sources described the outsourcing rules as a red line issue, adding that if they refused to concede this at the height of recession, they were certainly not going to concede it now when the country is in recovery.
Mr O'Connor was speaking after a special SIPTU conference to approve a new organisational structure for the union.
The conference also approved changes to the union's political fund, which traditionally had only supported members standing for the Labour Party.
In future, any member, whose membership is up to date, can apply for political funding - provided they are prepared to sign a pledge committing them to values espoused by the trade union movement.
The political fund consists of a deduction of 63c per member per year, and has reached up to 90,000 in the past.
The deduction is set to rise to 2c per week or €1.04 per year.
The fund will be also be used to fund political campaigns.
The National Executive Council will also establish a mechanism to monitor compliance by funded members with the objectives and undertakings outlined in the pledge.
In the 2016 General Election, SIPTU supported six candidates: Labour's Ger Dunne and Michael McCarthy, Independent Declan Bree, Gearoid Fitzgibbon of the Green Party, as well as Ashling Merriman and Brian Finucan of People Before Profit,
Each received €950.
Mr O'Connor said that because of a change to the rules of the Labour Party, the question of SIPTU's affiliation to the party is now irrelevant.
