Work starts today on a new pay deal for around 300 thousand State employees.

Some of the top union demands include the rolling back of pay cuts, the scrapping of the public service pension levy and the end of a demand for staff to work extra unpaid hours.

The current public sector pay bill comes to about 16 billion euro every year.

The timeline originally allowed about a fortnight for the process, but a number of factors, including the election of a new Fine Gael leader, could see that extended.