The Royal College of Nursing in Northern Ireland has lodged a formal dispute over failure to implement this year’s pay award for nursing staff.
The dispute, with the Northern Ireland Executive, Department of Health and health and social care employers, follows results of a ballot where RCN nurses voted against the proposed pay award of 3.6%.
In what has been described as the largest pay consultation ever run by the health union, 51% of its members took part with 80% of those saying the offer was not enough.
Nurses have yet to receive the pay award for this year (2025-2026) which their counterparts elsewhere in the UK have been told they will receive in their August pay.
The RCN NI said they have made it clear that their members are “not prepared to tolerate a repetition of their experiences” over the last two years, where their pay award was not confirmed for several months after it had been awarded elsewhere across the UK, and the uplift was not paid until the very end of the financial year.
The union added that despite the recent welcome intervention of the Health Minister Mike Nesbitt in issuing his ministerial direction, it “appears that we are, once again, in the same position”.
“Nursing and other health care staff in Northern Ireland are once again on the brink of stepping out of pay parity with colleagues across the UK,” said Rita Devlin, RCN Northern Ireland Executive Director.
“We have worked tirelessly to try and ensure that this does not happen again but there has been a failure in some political quarters to listen.
“Our members do not understand why, yet again, they are being treated by their own executive as second-class citizens and why, every year, the need to formulate a modest pay offer appears to catch the executive unprepared.
“The issue of pay should be accounted for in every year’s budget and a failure to do this is a failure of government.
“Without staff there is simply no health service, and we are at an absolute loss to explain this attitude towards nursing staff who are the largest professional group in the health service.
“As our recent pay consultation has shown, nursing staff in Northern Ireland and across the UK, don’t believe a 3.6% pay rise is enough, but to not even get that is an insult,” she said.
Health Minister Mike Nesbitt issued a statement throughout the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), as leader of the party and health minister, saying he shared the RCN’s “frustration”.
He added he “reflected my commitment” to maintaining pay parity by triggering the ministerial direction process to deliver the pay increases as soon as possible.
“In line with the ministerial direction process, my decision was referred to the wider executive.
“Unfortunately, that’s where it still sits,” he said.
“Our health workers deserve so much better.
“I note that the RCN is today saying that the ‘first step must be for the Northern Ireland Executive to deliver the long-overdue pay award for this year.’
“I couldn’t agree more,” Nesbitt added.
The Department of Health said it would not be issuing any statement on the RCN’s formal dispute.
