SIPTU has called on the Government and Health Service Executive (HSE) to assist workers being made redundant due to the closure of Mount Carmel Hospital, Dublin, in finding new jobs in the Health Service.

SIPTU Health Division Organiser, Paul Bell, said: “Every effort must be made to assist these highly skilled workers to find employment within the Health Service. We cannot afford to lose these people’s abilities and the HSE must facilitate them in finding employment in positions in which their skills can be fully utilised.  

The SIPTU Local Development Company (LDC) Committee has called on the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Phil Hogan, and the Minister for Agriculture, Food and Marine, Simon Coveney, to support rural communities by ensuring that 10% of the next European Union (EU) funded Rural Development Programme (RDP) is allocated to LEADER.  

SIPTU Vice-President, Patricia King, welcomed the publication of the ‘Review of Apprenticeship Training’ on Wednesday (22nd January) which proposes the development of an expanded dual-system of education in Ireland, combining on-the-job and class-based training.

Patricia King said: “It is encouraging that the Review recognises the scope for new opportunities across a wide range of sectors including ICT, retail, business administration, childcare and social care, hairdressing and beauty care, the green economy, retro-fitting and sustainable energy.   

SIPTU Vice-President, Patricia King, has said double standards within the Community and Voluntary (C&V) sector have been exposed with the retirement package of over €740,000 for the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Central Remedial Clinic (CRC), Paul Kiely.  

SIPTU members in St. Leo’s College, Carlow voted on Wednesday (29th January), in favour of industrial action in a dispute concerning unilateral changes to their terms and conditions of employment.

SIPTU Organiser, Bill Mulcahy, said: “SIPTU members at St. Leo’s College had no alternative but to ballot for industrial action due to the intransigence of management in its implementation of cuts to their terms and conditions of employment without agreement.    

Broadcaster, Joe Duffy, was presented with a specially commissioned trade union badge from 1913 to mark his contribution to the commemorations of the Dublin Lockout.

The badge, based on the design of the 1913 version issued to union members by Jim Larkin and the Irish Transport and General Workers Union, was presented to the broadcaster by SIPTU General Secretary, Joe O’Flynn, in Liberty Hall on Tuesday, (21st January).


Event in Liberty Hall where Joe Duffy was presented with a specially commissioned badge from SIPTU General Secretary Joe O'Flynn as a tribute to his contribution to the 1913 Lock Out Centenary Commemorations. Also present were Joe Duffy's wife, June (left), mother Mabel and SIPTU Vice President Patricia King (right).  ©Photo by Derek Speirs.

SIPTU members at the Tyndall National Institute, University College Cork (UCC) will intensify industrial action over the coming days in a dispute of over pay inequality.

SIPTU Organiser, Bill Mulcahy, said: “Following a one day work stoppage on Tuesday (21st January), members will be intensifying their industrial action at the facility including the expansion of work to rule measures and further work stoppages.”  

Appearing before the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Transport and Communications on Wednesday (15th January), SIPTU representatives called for a “real public debate” on the proposed privatisation of up to 10% of Bus Éireann and Dublin Bus routes.

SIPTU Utilities and Construction Division Organiser, Owen Reidy, described the decision by the National Transport Authority (NTA) to tender out the routes as “seriously flawed”.

There are forces in Ireland who would wish to develop and fund a new political project with the aim of increasing inequality in our society and further eroding workers rights. They seek to do this by claiming a concern with ‘reform’; in reality the only change they wish to deliver is that which benefits wealthy corporate interests.

Irish society must learn from past mistakes and not allow the current public questioning of its political class to, again, be hijacked by a greedy minority.  A degree of unity on the Left, accompanied by a more vigilant trade union movement could have prevented the unbridled free marketeering Progressive Democrats from grabbing the balance of power in what was a healthy and sustainable economy in 1997.  

This well-appointed Public Exhibition hosted in the Ideas Space on the third floor of the Arts and Humanities Research Institute, TCD, and better known as the Long Room Hub from December 2013 to February 2014 is well worth a visit. It is funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Glucksman Ireland House.