I didn’t offer a chronology. What I said was that the CP and HR effectively endorsed the Government’s actions.
Agreed but the unions subsequently recommended acceptance of the outcome which offered a comfort to the government against what was a dubious, albeit financially justifiable, course of action.
Not really. The legislation provided the means to implement the cuts but it was widely accepted that doing so was in breach of established employment law principles. It was wide open to challenge but that was never really an option in the circumstances.
Any employer seeking to take a similar approach these days would risk a visit to the WRC.