THE HEALTH Service Executive has said it will put in place contingency arrangements in the event of disruption to services provided by nurses supplied by agencies.
Nursing unions have forecast that a significant number of agency nurses may not make themselves available for work on new lower rates of pay, which are to come into force today.
The unions have said some health services, which are particularly reliant on agency personnel due to a moratorium on recruitment, could face curtailment.
The HSE has put in place a new system for securing staff provided by agencies in a move that it says will generate up to €40 million in savings. As part of the new arrangements, payments to the nurses provided by the agencies will be reduced significantly in some cases.
Moves were made last week under the aegis of the implementation body for the Croke Park agreement in the health sector to broker a deal on the agency dispute. Further talks will take place later in the week. However, in the interim, the new pay rates will come into effect from today.
At present, nurses provided by agencies are paid the 10th point on the staff nurse pay scale, regardless of experience.
Under the revised plans, nurses with less than two years’ experience will be paid at the minimum point of the new lower entry scale introduced. Other staff will be paid on the fifth point of the existing scale.
Unions have said that under the HSE plans, agency nurses would also receive reduced payments for working at night, on Sundays and on public holidays.
The HSE said yesterday that it was monitoring the situation.
The emergence of any gaps in services as a result of a shortage of agency staff will not be known until today, when it becomes clear how many agency nurses have opted to work on the new lower pay scales.
In a letter to senior HSE management, the Psychiatric Nurses’ Association said agency nurses appeared to be unanimous that they would not sign up to the new lower-paid contracts.
The association’s general secretary Des Kavanagh said that “services as a result are facing a far more serious threat than in the event of a strike”.
In a broadcast on the website of the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, its deputy general secretary Dave Hughes advised members: “If you work for less you will continue to be paid less, and we cannot guarantee that you will ever have a restoration of the appropriate rate of pay for nurses and midwives.”