Hospital staff to vote on industrial action

THOUSANDS of hospital staff are to ballot on industrial action next month.

Over 40,000 nurses have already voted for strike action and are set to discuss when to carry out a number of proposed 24-hour stoppages in early January.

Siptu representatives confirmed yesterday that over 7,000 healthcare workers are also considering a strike after failing to secure a pay rise. The union has accused the Government of flouting the Public Sector Stability Agreement, which awarded the workers an increase through an ‘independent job evaluation process’.

Siptu claims that many of the workers are performing duties of a higher skillset than in their job descriptions, alleging that some are being unpaid for duties worth up to €6,000 each year.

Representatives say the action is being taken following ‘the Government and the HSE ignoring formal requests to engage with Siptu... concerning the conduct of the job evaluation process which concluded in October’.

‘We agreed with the Government on the reintroduction of the support staff job evaluation scheme in 2016, after it had been suspended in 2009,’ Siptu Health Division organiser Paul Bell said. He added that the support staff affected had been ‘significantly disadvantaged’ by the delay.

Responding yesterday, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said he didn’t believe anyone would like to see strike action across the health service, as it is ‘ultimately the patients’ who would ‘lose out’.

‘We have a pay deal with public servants and the Government will honour that pay deal. It was only made earlier this year and it runs to 2020, and that involves pay restoration next year; increments for most public servants; up to two pay increases; and a special deal for new entrants costing hundreds of millions of euros,’ he said.