Two unions representing 40,000 nurses are to present a plan to members next Wednesday which could include industrial action.
The Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) and the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) said yesterday they would present a plan at a national pay rally in Dublin on Wednesday.
The unions also said they would lodge a 3 per cent cost-of-living claim on health employers.
The decision comes after the Labour Court rejected the unions' claims for increased pay and a shorter working week. The court said the unions' claim for a 10.6 per cent pay rise for all nursing and midwifery grades to bring them into line with social care workers could only be processed through benchmarking.
It also rejected a claim for a special allowance for nurses working in Dublin, and said to concede to the demand for a 35-hour working week "would have profound consequences".
INO general secretary Liam Doran said it was too early to suggest industrial action was inevitable as the plan would have to be voted on.
Des Kavanagh, PNA general secretary, said the court's recommendation would have nurses and midwives thinking they were once again being treated in a second-class fashion.
In a statement yesterday, Brendan Mulligan, of the Health Service Executive employers' agency, urged the unions to reconsider their positions in relation to benchmarking.
