Ambulance staff to put overtime ban in place from November

Staff in the National Ambulance Service who are members of the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) are to put in place an overtime ban from early November.

The move represents an escalation of a dispute over representation rights and the deduction of union subscriptions from pay.

Staff in the union's National Ambulance Service Representative Association (Nasra) branch have been engaged in limited industrial action since October 10th as part of the row. The union said the branch had about 500 members.

In a letter to the HSE, the general secretary of the PNA, Peter Hughes said that from 7am on November 7th, the union's members would not make themselves available for additional shifts outside of their rostered hours.

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He said the overtime ban would run in tandem with the existing industrial action.

The PNA said that under its current industrial action, vehicles that did not comply with daily inspections would be stood down at the location and not moved to any other location. All vehicles not in compliance with health and safety legislation and HSE ambulance drugs policy would also be stood down.

In addition, it said that staff would refrain from using their personal equipment and technology for work purposes unless they were in receipt of an allowance for same. They would also only start work at official roster time.

The HSE said last week that that industrial action by some ambulance personnel was putting “the National Ambulance Service in a potentially precarious position” .

The HSE said it did not recognise the PNA or its Nasra branch as a negotiating body for ambulance personnel.

The HSE said the the National Ambulance Service had put in place contingency plans to mitigate the risk of potential disruption to service.