A 10.5% Pay Offer Is on the Table. Thursday's Strike Is Still On

Irish public sector unions and the Government meet Kevin Foley's mediators again today, with a new number on the table and Thursday's strike still in the diary. The revised offer is understood to be worth 10.5 per cent, running until the early months of 2029. Compounded, sources put it near 11 per cent. Some lower-paid staff would gain as much as 17.8 per cent over the life of the deal. It includes a payment in 2026 of 1,200 euro or 2 per cent, whichever is higher, which would take this year's rises to 4 per cent, and it includes a local-bargaining element. Talks were adjourned on Sunday after a couple of hours. They resume because Foley is still looking for a path, not because a deal has been agreed.

Simon Harris, the Tanaiste and finance minister, called the offer a substantial improvement and said the coming hours were a small but crucial window to head off a second national stoppage. He said any deal had to be sustainable. Taoiseach Micheál Martin, speaking in Enniskillen, said the Government believed an agreement was now very possible, that the lower paid were the priority, and that inflation and the cost of living had been acknowledged. He also said the other side still had to consider it. Union sources do not share the confidence. Kevin Callinan, general secretary of Forsa, told members the engagement was very difficult and that preparations for a 24-hour stoppage on Thursday 12 November were well under way. He asked them to plan to attend a rally.

Why 10.5 per cent does not end the argument

The last agreement was worth 10.25 per cent over two and a half years and expired at the end of June. Unions have said they want better than that. A headline of 10.5 per cent is only a fraction above it, which is why a number that looks larger than last week's does not, on the union side, look like a landing. The earlier offer, rejected and reported as 7.75 per cent over two and a half years, was understood to be 6.75 per cent plus 1 per cent for local bargaining. The new package is a clear step up from that. It is not yet a clear step past the expired deal, except for the lower paid and for the 2026 payment. That is the gap Foley is being asked to close in the days before a summit.

Sunday morning's talks began with the 7.75 per cent offer already dead and the strike date untouched. Sunday evening adjourned with the new offer unread by the people who would have to vote for it. Forsa has also warned members that public descriptions of offers can be wrong. The figures in this piece are the ones RTE, the Irish Times and the Government's own ministers are using. They are not a ballot paper.

Thursday is still summit day

If the stoppage goes ahead, schools close for the day and health, local government and welfare services are disrupted. Nurses and midwives have already been told that emergency cover continues under national derogations, and that the work-to-rule stays in force around the strike. Rallies run from noon to 2pm in Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Waterford, Sligo, Tullamore and Letterkenny. The Dublin march may run from O'Connell Street to Government Buildings. Road closures for the European Political Community will already be up. About 50 leaders meet at the Convention Centre. Harris said he was confident those meetings, and Friday's informal EU council, could still go ahead. Europe's other argument this week, who speaks for the Union on Ukraine, is not the pay claim. It shares the building and the day.

Callinan has described the step after Thursday if the strike happens: a harder work-to-rule, and rolling action in parts of the public service rather than another single national day. More than 300,000 workers walked out for 24 hours last month. A second date was suspended so talks could start, then put back. Neil McDonnell, of the employers' group ISME, said the private sector would watch any deal for a productivity commitment. The mediators have today, and not many days after it. The rallies are still in the diary.