They make an unlikely pairing but 55 DART drivers with Iarnrod Eireann and 27,500 nurses in the State's health services could determine whether social partnership survives into the new millennium. One thing they share is industrial muscle.
If Monday's DART strike goes ahead, between 40,000 and 50,000 people will have to find alternative ways of getting to work. If the nurses decide to reject the latest Labour Court award, which will cost the exchequer £100 million to honour this year, then all 3.5 million citizens of this Republic had better not fall ill.
The resolution of the DART strike is fraught with dangers for the Government. The easy solution for the Government is to throw a few thousand pounds at the drivers, who have already been offered £8,000 essentially to allow eight new trainees to learn how to drive what are virtually automatically operated vehicles.
If the drivers succeed it will be hard to persuade nurses to set their limits on any horizon nearer than the rainbow. The stance of the DART drivers makes the claim by Dublin Bus drivers for a 20 per cent pay increase seem benign.
Already other groups, most notably teachers, are beginning to circle the nurses' dispute. When they signed up for the 2 per cent local bargaining clause of Partnership 2000 in July, the general secretary of the Irish National Teachers' Organisation, Mr Joe O'Toole, warned the Department of Finance they would be back for more if the nurses' award breached national agreement boundaries.
On Wednesday the president of the Association of Secondary Teachers, Ireland, Ms Bernardine O'Sullivan, warned that her members were becoming frustrated over pay levels.
The irony is that many staff nurses still feel short changed because, despite all the concessions wrested from the Government over the past two years, they are still earning significantly less than teachers. A teacher with 13 years' service can earn between £25,000 and £27,000 a year. A staff nurse with similar service and qualifications earns about £23,000.
However, there is another way nurses can look at their situation. In January 1997, when they first threatened strike action, staff nurses were earning £17,747 at the top of the scale. If they accept the current offer they will be earning £22,339 by July 1st, 2000. Many will also have allowances of between £1,000 and £1,500.
Similarly, ward sisters earning £20,023 in January 1997 will be earning £27,522 by July 1st, 2000. Many of them will also have access to the allowances. Both groups also have access to premiums for weekend work and overtime that can significantly increase that basic amount. That is not bad progress in a pay dispute where nurses have never had to spend a day on the picket line.
There are, of course, other issues of concern to nurses. They have a longer working week than any other health professionals - 39 hours, as opposed to 35 - and the proposal in the Labour Court recommendation that directors of nursing report to general managers is deeply offensive to many nurses. It is also a worrying indicator that, for all the rhetoric about parity of esteem, nursing is still seen as a subordinate health profession.
Today the Nursing Alliance is holding a press conference, where it hopes to present a united front. There are indications that its own executive is too divided to give a lead to the membership. The deal is a good one. It could be sold to the membership. But these are good times generally.
The nursing unions, like those in CIE, the ESB and the Garda, have members whose experience of dealing with a cash-flush Government suggests there is always more in the kitty. The ballot by the Garda Representative Association on their latest award, due to conclude today, is expected to be narrow. Then there are the DART drivers. If they receive more cash simply to allow badly needed extra drivers to be trained it will make it hard for public service trade union leaders to preach moderation.
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