Officials from my Department have engaged with the staff representative bodies in respect of the conclusion of the temporary Special Scheme re Long Covid on a number of occasions, both in advance of the Labour Court hearing that took place last October, and after. The management side was represented by officials from my Department, the Department of Public Expenditure, NDP and Reform, and the HSE at that Labour Court hearing.
There has been extensive engagement between the parties over the first three months of the year in respect of the Labour Court recommendation, which was that the parties should engage to 'explore the supports already in place that are available to those impacted by long Covid'. These engagements have taken the form of both online and in person meetings between the parties.
As part of these engagements, the HSE committed to providing data to the staff bodies in respect of numbers impacted, and this material has been submitted to the staff bodies by the HSE electronically.
Despite the extensive engagement between the parties in line with the recommendation of the Court,, the matter has now been referred back to the WRC by the staff representative bodies, where the parties have agreed to engage further.
