Lower-paid staff in the public service

want their pay concerns to be prioritised following new salary proposals put forward for hospital consultants, Siptu has said.

Siptu's health division organiser, Paul Bell, said there would be a "reaction" from lower-paid staff to the new pay deal proposed for hospital consultants.

He said Siptu represented 40,000 workers in the health service and they had always understood that lower-paid staff would be first in the queue for any pay review in the public ser vice.

Mr Bell said members believed that under the proposed new deal for consultants, “ a disproportionate exception had been made for a group of highly paid staff”.

The proposed deal also raised questions about how the incremental pay scale would operate in the public service, he added. Under new proposals drawn up by the Labour Relations Commission, hospital consultants working exclusively in the public service could reach the maximum pay rate of €175,000 at a faster rate than previously envisaged. Those with private practice rights would receive lower salaries.

Rejected

In October, doctors who are members of the

Irish Medical Organisation

overwhelmingly rejected pay proposals drawn up by Labour Relations Commission chief executive

Kieran Mulvey

.

The Irish Hospital Consultants Association was not involved in the talks that led to the proposals as it has not signed up to the Haddington Road agreement on public service pay and productivity.

The pay rates under the new proposals remain unchanged but doctors would get to the top of the scale in nine years rather than 12 as previously proposed.

For doctors working exclusively in public hospitals with no private practice – the so-called category-A contract – the entry rate would be €127,000.