THE £20 million pay package to nurses could provide a salary of £2,500 for staff nurses, but the price would be no increase for the higher nursing grades.
At one stage in this week's pay talks it is understood the team of management negotiators said the gap between the two sides could be bridged within the available budget by introducing three new increments for staff nurses with over nine years' service.
However, this would have left nothing in the kitty to pay increases to ward sisters, unit nurse managers or directors of nursing. These are all groups that both sides in the dispute accept are grossly underpaid.
Management has indicated that the cost of paying staff nurses £20,500 at the top of the scale, after 15 years' service, plus giving, significant increases to the supervisory and management grades would be £37 million - a lot more than the Government's opening offer of £10 million.
On Monday the nursing unions are meeting to plan the logistics of balloting members on the latest pay offer, which is based on giving the State's 17,000 staff nurses £19,200 at the top of the scale. At a meeting yesterday the unions agreed formally to recommend rejection of the offer, which emerged from three days of exploratory talks.
Within minutes of the talks, breaking down on Thursday night, the Minister for Health, Mr Noonan, issued a statement regretting the initial rejection by the union negotiators.
In a radio interview yesterday he pointed out that most staff nurses earned an extra 20 per cent on their basic pay in overtime and shift premiums. In other words, the real earnings of staff nurses were in the £15,000 to £23,000 range, before tax.
Mr Noel Dowling, SIPTU nursing officer, said later: "The bottom line is that there is no serious acknowledgment on the management's part that staff nurses are badly paid for the difficult work they undertake.
"They acknowledge the rates within the profession are too low to attract the calibre of managers they need.
"We fully acknowledge something has to be done for ward sisters and nurse managers, but it shouldn't be done by keeping the wages of staff nurses depressed."