Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

In general, the criteria, the terms of reference and operation of benchmarking are worked out between management and unions. That has already been done and worked out for the next round of benchmarking. There are many difficulties in this particular case. First, some of the nurses, the INO and PNA, have not signed up to Towards 2016, while those who are members of SIPTU have. The Labour Court has made its position clear that the issue is a matter for the benchmarking process. The criteria have already been worked out for the next round of benchmarking and both the union and management sides have had a role in fixing those criteria. Their position has been agreed and that is part of the problem, that it is an agreed position between both sides.

There are several issues involved. On the issue of the 35-hour week, this could have been discussed between management and union sides if it arose at the benchmarking discussions. My people and others tried hard in the national implementation body, NIB, discussions over the past three weeks to make progress on the issue, and did make some progress. The issue of the pay anomaly is also related to the situation. It arises as a result of pay adjustments for nurses and midwives and affects a small number of people. I believe it can be resolved.

The big issue is the 10.6% pay increase demand. We have no mechanism to resolve that because it flies in the face of the overall pay agreement. There are possibilities in the other areas — other people worked hard for three weeks to achieve that position. The Labour Court has recommended that the issue can be dealt with only through benchmarking. The national implementation body, NIB, despite all its efforts over the past three weeks, was unable to find an alternative solution.

The dilemma in which we find ourselves is that conceding the nurses' demand on pay would spell the end of pay policy, the collapse of the arrangements made not just with the rest of the public service, but with workers generally across the economy. That is the issue we cannot resolve. This is not the fault of benchmarking but is due to the fact that we have a national agreement and we cannot have two.

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