Around 2,000 SIPTU members in the National Ambulance Service have voted overwhelmingly for industrial action, up to and including strike action.
The union has accused the Health Service Executive (HSE) of failing to implement the recommendations of an independent report on updating staff salary scales to reflect changes in their responsibilities and workload over the last 20 years.
The dispute involves SIPTU members working as emergency medical technicians (EMTs), paramedics, advanced paramedics, specialist paramedics and paramedic supervisors.
"The overwhelming mandate from our members for industrial action up to and including strike action is an indication of the depth of feeling within the service that their sacrifice and commitment over the last 20 years to the professionalisation and modernisation of the service have been forgotten about by the HSE," said SIPTU Ambulance Sector Organiser, John McCamley.
The union said that ambulance personnel have implemented changes within the service, seeing the model move away from just a patient transport to a higher degree of pre-hospital care and treatment.
"Our members have to exercise clinical judgement, deliver complex and lifesaving care, including the administration of medications," Mr McCamley said.
"Given this overwhelming result by SIPTU members for industrial action, we call on the HSE to implement the recommendations of the independent report without preconditions and to introduce enhanced pay scales which properly recognise the training and professional level at which our members are now carrying out their duties on a daily basis," he added.
The HSE said it met with SIPTU and Unite in February and confirmed it was committed to entering further discussion on the substantive elements of Workplace Relations Commission proposals, which included new pay scales for relevant grades that recognise past, present and future transformative change, subject to the financial envelope approved by the Department of Health and with the consent and sanction of the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform.
"This proposal was rejected by SIPTU and Unite, who immediately advised of their intention to ballot for industrial action," the HSE said
The HSE added that it remains committed to engagement through the dispute resolution processes set out in the Public Service Agreement and calls upon both SIPTU and Unite to also commit to doing so.
"In this regard, the HSE's position is that this industrial action is unwarranted and presents a potential for impact on service delivery to patients," a spokesperson said.
"The decision by SIPTU to ballot their members for industrial action would appear to be in contradiction to the provisions of the Public Service Agreement," they added.
