Private sector workers ‘to be recognised’ in plans for healthcare staff ‘bonus’

The precise format of a bonus to be paid to frontline healthcare workers must be agreed with the social partners and will also have to take account of some key private sector employees, the Dáil has heard.

Taoiseach Micheál Martin confirmed the Government will “recognise the frontline healthcare workers in respect of the extraordinary contribution and commitment they have made to the fight against the pandemic”.

He said some workers in the private sector had also made an “outstanding contribution” particularly in periods of severe lockdown.

Mr Martin said the Government wanted to recognise this contribution “in a non-divisive way and to consult the partners, perhaps through the Labour Employer Economic Forum (LEEF) to discuss this further and get it right”.

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He was responding to Regional Independent TD Denis Naughten who called for time off and bonuses to be paid to frontline healthcare workers who he said were exhausted physically and mentally.

The Roscommon-Galway TD appealed to the Taoiseach “not to postpone this much-needed recognition until the end of the pandemic, but instead to move on the need for the recognition of healthcare workers now”.

He raised the issue in the Dáil last July when he said that “if it was not possible to reward healthcare workers with pay increases or some form of bonus system, the minimum we should offer them is additional paid leave”.

‘Sacrificed’

It would be “time to spend with their families, with whom they may have sacrificed precious family time, or time to recover from the physical and emotional tiredness they undoubtedly must be feeling”.

He noted the Taoiseach’s positive response and his comments about the “importance of recognition of people who went to exceptional lengths to help people on an individual basis and, by so doing, helped the country at large to get through this crisis”.

Mr Naughten said “we must provide staff with time off because exhausted healthcare staff are a recipe for mistakes”, adding that “proper recognition to staff at the front line in the battle against Covid-19”.

The Taoiseach pledged there would be recognition of the work of frontline healthcare workers.

“The precise mechanisms and manner in which this will be determined will have to be worked out in consultation with the social partners, while also bearing in mind some key workers in the private sector who have made an outstanding contribution as well, particularly in periods of severe lockdown.”