Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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All public health sector employees in the HSE and Section 38 bodies such as St Michael House, including Staff Nurses, are paid in line with public pay policy, and the Department of Health Consolidated Salary Scales.

Changes to rates of pay occur periodically and are generally negotiated in partnership with the public sector unions as part of public sector pay talks. In advance of each Public Service Stability Agreement (PSSA), a series of pay talks takes place between the trade unions and their representative bodies and the civil and public sector employer representatives. It is during the engagement at these pay talks that agreement is reached between the parties in relation to any revisions to public sector pay (including for Staff Nurses), in return for a set of agreed productivity and efficiency measures.

However, it is important to note that the current public service agreement ‘Building Momentum’ has provided several increases in respect of pay for staff of the public health sector since it was agreed in 2021.

Building Momentum was extended last year to run until the end of 2023, and additional increases were agreed as part of the extension in acknowledgement of the higher than anticipated rates of inflation that have emerged since 2021 and in particular the impact of the cost-of-living pressures.

Three additional pay adjustments totalling 6.5% are provided for under the extension over 2022 and 2023. These are increases to annualised basic rates of remuneration of 3% for 2 February 2022 (applied retrospectively), 2% for 1 March 2023, and a further increase of 1.5% or €750, whichever is greater, for 1 October 2023.

The original Building Momentum agreement provides benefits of 3%. In total, including the original Agreement and the extension, benefits over the lifetime of the agreement amount to increases of 9.5%, and in respect of lower paid public health sector employees, amounts to increases of 12.5% over its lifetime.

It is not possible to negotiate any changes to public servant pay rates outside of the PSSA process.