Sinn Féin spokesperson for Social Protection, Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire TD, has called on Minister Heather Humphries to intervene with the Department of Public Expenditure, to end the logjam that has led to workers in Citizens Information Service (CIS) announcing a strike.

Teachta Ó Laoghaire said:

“More than tens of thousands of people rely on the Citizens Information service. It is a vitally important, high-quality service which provides important information, advice and advocacy services to the public right across the country.

“To ensure it remains a high-quality service, we need to ensure appropriately skilled and experienced staff are attracted to it. The pay has not changed for those in the Citizens Information service in 16 years, since 2008.

“That is an absolutely extraordinary amount of time considering the extent of inflation over that period. The starting salary is less than €30,000.

“Recruitment campaigns to the service have not been successful in recent times. It is not attracting people and it is easy to understand that.

“This is a serious problem and attempts to address it have been ongoing for some time.

“As a result of Government’s stalling over providing a pay increase, SIPTU members employed in the Citizens Information Service have voted overwhelmingly in favour of strike action.  Workers across the country will begin indefinite strike action on 7 October.

“The Employers group, which represents the companies who manage the Citizens information service are in fact in agreement with the pay claim lodged by the Citizens Information service workers, but it has been halted by DPER.

“The Minister for Social Protection, Heather Humphreys needs to take responsibility here and needs to be clear with the steps that she is taking to ensure that these workers are provided with a pay increase. These are workers who provide a vital service to the public and have not been provided with a pay increase since 2008!

“The Minister needs to intervene and to be clear now if she will, along with the Department of Public Expenditure, ensure that the funding is provided to the Citizens Information Board to guarantee the workers in this vital service receive a well deserved pay increase.

“Citizens Information workers should be paid fairly for the vitally important work that they do and should receive a pay increase without any further delay. These workers deserve so much better.”