Congress was one of the two governing bodies that emerged after the split in the Irish trade union body the Irish Trades Union Congress in 1945.
The split developed under pressure from an anticipated fresh labour-state relationship, and alleged 'British domination in ITUC'.
The aim of the CIU was to create a trade union movement in Ireland which was Irish-based and nationalistic in outlook, in contrast to the more internationalist and socialist ITUC which had 146,000 members.
The Government, contrary to expectation, did not legislate against the British unions, and from 1953 encouraged a détente between the two factions.
438–439 From the EMIRE database, which is the online version of the European Employment and Industrial Relations Glossaries