Members of the Irish Nurses' Organisation (INO) yesterday dismissed as "insulting" the pay rise for staff nurses recommended by the benchmarking body.
The union stopped short, however, of rejecting the body's findings until a timetable for payment and a number of related issues are clarified. If these are not resolved to the INO's satisfaction, it plans to ballot members on the issue in January.
The union's general secretary, Mr Liam Doran, told delegates at a special conference of the INO in Dublin yesterday that nurses could not accept the benchmarking report. They had to be "very careful", however, about the nature and timing of any action.
The union should not begin industrial action with every other union "waiting in the wings", he said. "We will not fight the fight for others who have never fought it for us."
A ballot for industrial action has already begun, however, among nurses trained to work with people with intellectual disabilities. They say the benchmarking process has resulted in a serious anomaly, which sees them earning less than assistant house parents, who require no qualifications.
Mr Doran said the benchmarking report had been "disappointing, incomplete, confusing and inadequate". Some of the INO's claims simply had not been addressed, he said.
These included the introduction of a 35-hour working week, premium payments for increased unsocial hours and the introduction of a Dublin weighting allowance. The conference endorsed a proposal to "vigorously pursue" those claims through the Labour Relations Commission.
Mr Doran said the report, apart from addressing existing inequalities, had created two new anomalies. A second anomaly created by the report was that public health nurses were now to be paid less than those on the old ward sister, now CNS2, grade, he said. This was contrary to the position adopted by the Commission on Nursing.
