More than 8,000 nurses benefit significantly from the latest Labour Court award, which is worth approximately £20 million. But the 3,350 new promotional posts, which open up greater career prospects to staff nurses, are in some ways the most important element.
Put simply, a staff nurse's chances of promotion have been doubled. Also important is the withdrawal of the requirement that all directors of nursing report to general managers.
An implementation programme identifying priority areas is also to be created.
In short, the court has taken on board many of the arguments put by the Nursing Alliance negotiators. For instance, the unions had sought 2,000 clinical nurse specialists while the management side offered 750. The court has awarded 1,250 posts. The unions had sought a new senior staff nurse grade with 3,000 posts. Management had conceded the grade in principle but wanted only 1,000 posts. The court awarded 2,500.
The unions had also sought a long-service increment of 6 per cent. Nurses entering the new grade will receive 5 per cent.
The alliance sought an additional 2,000 clinical nurse manager grade I (CNM1 or junior ward sister) posts. Management proposed 600 and the court awarded 1,100. The chairman of the Labour Court, Mr Finbarr Flood, also ruled that half of the initial intake to the CNMI grade should be on the basis of seniority.
Thus the alliance has achieved over 3,000 posts in total for some of the longest-serving staff nurses. Its original target had been 4,000. If there is a slight shortfall in numbers, it is more than made up for by entrants to the CNMI posts being paid 14 per cent more than under the union's original aim of a further long-service increment. The new clinical nurse specialists will have a scale allowing for an increase of almost 20 per cent.
Many of the nurses appointed to these new posts may have only a few years to serve. This will create further opportunities for a relatively high number of nurses.
The extension of the £1,500 in location and qualifications allowances to 1,350 public health nurses addresses one of the anomalies which arose from the last Labour Court award, and led to its rejection. Similarly, the extension of the location allowance to psychiatric and mental handicap nurses will address grievances specific to those disciplines.
Another small but important award is overtime rates for nurses working between 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. Prison officers have had this benefit for some time, and gardai were awarded it in their recent pay negotiations.
Nurse tutors, a small but influential group, are to receive increases worth between 4 and 10 per cent, while the concerns of nurse managers over reporting procedures are also addressed. The possibility of further significant pay increases for nurse managers, even if it is performance-related and in a post-2000 environment, will also be welcome.
All 28,000 nurses in the public health services will receive a £1,250 lump sum and a 2 per cent pay rise backdated to July 1st, 1999.
In the August award staff nurses received three extra leave days, on an incremental basis, to take account of their working longer hours than other health professionals. Ward sisters and higher management grades received four days' extra annual leave.
All nurses will also receive lump sums of £1,250 under the August award, and an estimated 10,000 benefited from the initial application of increased allowances. These were boosted from £328 a year to between £1,000 and £1,500.
The cost of the current award and the August award is £120 million. This brings the total cost to the Exchequer of awards to the nurses in the past two years to well over £200 million. The initial offer to nurses, back in 1996, was £20 million.