The Department of Justice is seeking extra appointments to its probation and welfare service to avert a strike threat by IMPACT.
The union's members voted on Saturday to hold a strike ballot because of the Department's failure to appoint 75 extra probation officers, as recommended by an independent expert working group last November.
If the action goes ahead IMPACT is likely to instruct its members to cut their caseload to a maximum of 30. At present probation officers handle up to 100 clients each.
IMPACT's assistant general secretary, Mr Peter Nolan, said the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, had expressed sympathy with the union's case when he met IMPACT last week. He said he would be seeking sanction from the Department of Finance for the extra posts.
"Probation officers have argued their case patiently and rationally," Mr Nolan said yesterday. "The threat of serious industrial action should concentrate minds in the Government."
He said the cost of dealing with offenders through the probation service was £2,000 a year, compared to more than £43,000 to lock them up.