Northern Ireland nurse union demands pay offer
The Royal College of Nursing has urged the Northern Irish government to issue an immediate pay offer to Health and Social Care (HSC) staff, dubbing the delay “unacceptable”.
Nurses in Northern Ireland have still not been given a pay deal for the 2024-25 financial year, while their NHS counterparts in England, Scotland and Wales have all now been offered a 5.5% increase.
“While the rest of the UK has had notification about a pay award, Northern Ireland has yet to hear anything”
Rita Devlin
With a pay deal almost six months overdue, RCN Northern Ireland director Rita Devlin confirmed that the union had written to the first and deputy first ministers this week asking for an “urgent update”.
Should an offer fail to materialise, the union would have to “consider” its position, warned Ms Devlin.
“While the rest of the UK has had notification about a pay award, Northern Ireland has yet to hear anything,” she said.
“We know that representatives from the Northern Ireland Executive have been in discussions with the Treasury and have been trying to confirm funding for pay awards and other initiatives.”
Ms Devlin said staff “cannot afford to be out of pocket”, and that Northern Irish staff falling out of pay parity again with their equivalents in England, Scotland and Wales was “simply not an option”.
“This pay award is already months overdue and it completely unacceptable that nursing staff in Northern Ireland should have to wait any longer for a pay award to be announced,” she said.
Rita Devlin
“Falling out of pay parity again is simply not an option and we will have to consider our position carefully if movement does not happen soon.”
The pay rises for staff in the other three countries, backdated to April of this year, will all be implemented in the next two months.
Meanwhile, the devolved Northern Irish Department of Health is yet to issue any news of a forthcoming pay deal for its more than 20,000 nursing and midwifery staff in the HSC, along with all other Agenda for Change contracted workers.
While the pay deals elsewhere in the UK are already signed off, RCN members in England recently voted to show their dissatisfaction with the award, and a ballot of Welsh RCN members opened earlier this week.
RCN Scotland approved a pay deal from the devolved Scottish Government on Tuesday.
The Northern Irish Department of Health has been contacted for comment.
