Union leaders representing Ireland's public servants meet on Monday to decide whether to recommend another national strike on Wednesday 11 November. The public services committee of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions will be briefed on talks that the Workplace Relations Commission adjourned after ten days, and it is due to vote on a motion covering about 300,000 staff in schools, hospitals, local authorities and other state services.
Kevin Callinan, general secretary of Forsa and the lead union negotiator, has said the government has still not made what the unions would call a credible offer on pay. Any text, he has said, also has to be capable of winning a ballot of members. Sunday's picture was an impasse and a request to Kevin Foley. Monday is the meeting that turns that picture into a recommendation, or refuses to.
What the two sides say they are apart on
The union position has three heads. They want compensation for the gap between pay rises and inflation over the past five years. They want an additional increase for the second half of 2026. They want safeguards if prices rise again during the life of a new deal. Callinan has described the gap as significant. People close to the talks have used a blunter word: miles.
Government sources, speaking on Sunday, were more hopeful than that. They said back-channel contact continued over the weekend, that a breakdown before a restart is a pattern from earlier rounds, and that the pay offer on the table is reasonable. Local bargaining clauses, they said, are almost agreed. A full return to the table could come later in the week, once the steering group chaired by Foley, of the WRC, has looked at the stuck issues. An attempt to restart the formal process is expected on Tuesday. Other matters would stay with the commission.
Monday's Decision
- Who meets: the ICTU public services committee, including affiliates who were not in the room for all ten days.
- The motion: whether to recommend a further all-out strike on Wednesday 11 November, covering about 300,000 workers.
- What would close: schools again, with hospitals, councils and other services hit, and demonstrations in Dublin and other cities.
- The WRC's Saturday line: some issues are at an impasse. It has asked the government-appointed group chaired by Kevin Foley to propose a way through.
- Notice: unions say seven days is required, and that health is already covered by the original notice and the work to rule. The usual health notice is nearer three weeks.
Why parents and hospital managers are watching the clock
A strike on 11 November needs notice early this week if it is to be orderly. Callinan has already warned affiliate unions that a second national stoppage would close schools again and disrupt hospitals and councils. In health, employers usually expect a longer lead time. The unions' view is that the original notice, and the work to rule already in place, still covers them. That is a dispute about procedure sitting on top of a dispute about money. It is also the reason Monday's vote matters even if Foley is still writing.
Jack Chambers and the government side have spent the last fortnight saying nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. Simon Harris has said he still wants a deal. Neither sentence closes a school. A recommendation from the committee does not, by itself, either. Members would still have to be balloted on any offer, which is Callinan's other condition. What the committee can do today is tell the government that 11 November is the working plan unless a credible number appears before the notice has to be settled.
What a British reader should take from it
The talks are Irish, the services are Irish, and the spill is not confined to the Republic. Families, suppliers and public bodies with staff or contracts in Ireland should treat Wednesday week as live until the committee and Foley say otherwise. Thursday's adjournment near 10pm was the moment the week stopped looking like a closing session. The WRC's request to Foley was an attempt to keep a door open without pretending the door was a deal. Government figures think that door is how previous agreements have been reached. Union figures will believe it when they can take a text to a ballot.
Monday does not have to end in a strike notice. It does have to end in a decision about whether the affiliates who were not at the table are prepared to wait for Foley, or whether they want the date in the diary. That is the whole of the morning's argument.