Formal Labour Court talks in firefighter dispute scheduled for next Monday

The Labour Court has called both sides in the firefighters’ dispute back for talks next week after exploratory discussions between the two sides on Monday. In the meantime the suspension of Tuesday’s strike action announced on Sunday remains in place and other ongoing industrial action will be “de-escalated” to allow for the process to be progress.

Monday talks at the Labour Court, involving representatives of the Local Government Management Agency (LGMA) and Siptu, went on for around seven hours, and while there was little detailed discussion of how differences on pay might be addressed the court’s officials believed there was enough of a basis to work on to call both sides back in next week.

“We didn’t get into any specifics about the (main issues) today other than to make it clear in our engagement with the court that unless resources are released to deal with the pay and the retainer issues then no solution will be possible,” said Karan O’Loughlin of Siptu after the talks. “The court spoke to all of the parties and still believed that its intervention could be helpful so we take the court’s assurances in that regard.”

About 2,000 retained firefighters had been due to start an all-out strike at roughly 200 stations from Tuesday in a long-running dispute over pay as well as rosters and time off. At present the workers receive a retainer of between around €8,000 and €12,000 plus payment for mandatory training after which remuneration is based on call-outs. Time off is a major issue at many stations were staff are expected to be on call 24/7 for 48 weeks a year.

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Ms O’Loughlin said it had not been made clear on Monday whether next week’s engagement was intended to be for one day or more but that Siptu would fully engage with the court. “In the meantime the strike will remain suspended and the industrial action will be de-escalated,” she said.

“The court wouldn’t be inclined to use their statutory powers to call us in back unless the court was of the view that doing so would be helpful. So that certainly signals progress. In my opinion.”

In a statement the LGMA said it welcomed the move by Siptu to de-escalate the situation pending next week’s formal hearing.