Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Of course, any individual has a right to join any trade union or body that he or she wants to join, but the Psychiatric Nurses Association of Ireland which is not affiliated to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions has negotiating rights for nurses working in psychiatry and the intellectual disability sector. The clue is in the name. There are three unions which have negotiating rights with the HSE for front-line ambulance staff, namely, the Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union, SIPTU, Fórsa and Unite. They represent all of the ambulance grades. Industrial relations policy has a long-standing objective of avoiding fragmentation of worker representation in public sector employment and the trade union movement more generally. This is meant to facilitate the orderly conduct of bargaining and other aspects of industrial relations. There are three unions for paramedics and ambulance grades that already have negotiating rights-----

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