Nurses claim threat to pay rise linked to protests

NURSES claim a threat to withhold a pay increase due next month is linked to their accident and emergency protests despite health service managers’ denials.

In a worsening of the row between the Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) and the Health Service Executive (HSE), nurses reiterated their claims that the attempt to block a 3.5% pay rise due under benchmarking was a “retaliatory strike” for their ongoing campaign to highlight overcrowding in A&Es.

However, the HSE yesterday claimed the threat was a result of failure by the INO to co-operate with plans to introduce and train a new healthcare assistant grade.

A spokesperson for the HSE said any breach of the benchmarking process had to be cited by last Friday and that the timing of the pay threat had nothing to do with the protests.

INO deputy general secretary Dave Hughes said the union had clear evidence that nurses were being “set up” in retaliation for their involvement in highlighting overcrowding in A&Es.

“It is a spurious attempt using a trumped-up charge to deprive 30,000 people of their pay increase,” he said. Mr Hughes also claimed that there was not a court in the land that would find the INO in breach of procedures. “They (HSE) are trying to put us offside. They are trying to put us in a bad light because we have been highlighting the problems in the health service.”

He said the dispute centres around one of the eight training modules for care attendants. Still to be agreed was the training required for taking blood pressure and temperature readings. On April 1, the HSE wrote to the INO seeking their agreement to the last part of the training programme. The INO insisted, however, that the issue could not be agreed before their annual conference, which takes place next week.

Mr Hughes also said that the Labour Relations Commission and the Labour Court would have to be involved to establish whether or not the INO was actually in breach of procedures.

“It’s a very big try-on,” he said.

“They (HSE) might be buying more trouble than they bargained for. We have our annual conference starting tomorrow. I think there will be a lot of anger expressed there and probably a lot of emergency motions calling for action,” he said. In any event, if the HSE did decide to withdraw the pay rise, they could expect industrial action in retaliation.

Meanwhile, the HSE claimed progress was being made to alleviate pressure on A&E departments.

National Hospital Office director Pat McLoughlin said the key to tackling the overall A&E problem will be how patients were moved through hospitals and into more appropriate settings. He pointed out that in the past two weeks they had helped 55 patients to move on to a more appropriate setting and 45 to go home.

“This is only the beginning,” he said.

“We’re confident that when the full range of measures for delayed discharges come on stream, we will see a significant on the numbers waiting in A&E departments.”