Nurses warn of threat to industrial stability ahead of pay talks

Nurses have warned that industrial stability could be jeopardised if the Government does not address their calls for measures, including new financial incentives, to tackle staff recruitment and retention problems in the health service.

The warning came after Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe ruled out any special additional deal for 50,000 doctors, nurses and midwives to address staff shortages as part of the forthcoming negotiations on a revised public service pay accord.

The Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) responded by saying that such a stance could jeopardise the Government's objective of securing industrial relations stability.

Seprately trade union leaders were told by the Workplace Relations Commission on Wednesday that talks with the Government on an extension to the existing Lansdowne Road agreement will formally get underway next Monday morning with a briefing on the economy provided by the Department of Finance.

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The talks are expected to run for about a fortnight.

Sources said some union leaders have also been told that the Department of Public Expenditure is not in favour of side deals aimed at addressing particuarly side issues or grievances being part of the negotiations.

Side deals or chairman’s notes, as they were formally known, were a feature of previous agreements between government and public service unions.

Range of issues

Unions are understood to have indicated that they will be raising a range of issues at the talks including the roling back of financial emergency legislation which underpinned pay cuts since 2009, the elimination of the pension levy and the abolition of the requirement for additional working hours without extra pay.

Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Seán O'Rourke, Mr Donohoe said the Government wanted to reach a collective agreement applying across the public service and would not be in a position to conclude a separate deal with any one group.

Unions representing more than 50,000 doctors, nurses and midwives on Tuesday warned that any new public service agreement would have to contain flexibility to provide for special incentives to tackle recruitment and retention problems in the health sector.

However, the Minister said an orderly unwinding of the financial emergency legislation known as FEMPI would be the best and most affordable way of developing a better package for people to keep them in the public system.

He said that when pay cuts and a pension levy were imposed during the crisis, workers earning €35,000 experienced the same pay cut no matter what job they were doing - and if they started to unwind those measures at a different rate for different public servants, it would be neither fair nor affordable.

He said that if the government reached a a deal for one part of the public service like nurses, it could trigger further pay claims in other grades.

INMO general secretary Liam Doran said nurses had a clear agenda going into the new talks.

“Our members want their money back that was cut in recent years and a return of their conditions of employment,” he said.

“Secondly we need measures to address the recruitment and retention crisis that has grown up particularly over the last four or five years in the in ability of the Irish health service to attract and retain nurses, midwives and doctors.”