Hundreds of thousands of Irish teachers, doctors and civil servants have walked off the job

LONDON -- Hundreds of thousands of teachers, doctors and civil servants walked off the job in Ireland on Wednesday, crippling public services across the country as workers demand higher wages to offset the rising cost of living.

Most schools, colleges and universities are closed and thousands of medical appointments have been canceled because of the one-day strike, which was called to pressure Prime Minister Micheál Martin to intervene in the talks, which have been stalled since June.

Speaking at Mater Hospital in Dublin, the head of the main public employees union, Forsa, blamed the government for failing to address the pay demands of workers.

“The government needs to respond to our members today, right across the country,” said Kevin Callinan, Forsa’s general secretary. “The struggles they’re having with the cost of living, the sense of a breach of trust that’s happened with the Department of Public Expenditure. They’re the issues that need to be faced up to by the government now.”

Consumer price inflation accelerated to 4.1% in the 12 months through September, the highest rate since January 2024, Ireland’s Central Statistics Office said last week. Housing costs jumped 9.5% in the period and transportation expenses rose 7.5%.

Conor Carroll was on the picket line Wednesday at St. Michael’s Hospital in Dun Laoghaire, a coastal town south of Dublin. The hospital porter said that the dispute was all about the cost of living.

“Every time you go to the supermarket you feel it,” Carroll told The Irish Times. “Everything’s gone up, even the cost of eating. And whatever you’re earning doesn’t feel like enough these days.”

The government had tried to head off the strike by highlighting its commitment to put an additional 1.2 billion euros ($1.34 billion) into public sector pay.

Martin said Wednesday that he was open to being an “honest broker” to resolve the pay dispute.

The government’s budget decisions provided “a very strong foundation” for public service pay talks, he said, adding that he detected “goodwill all round.”

“I think the foundations are there for a very substantive engagement between unions and government, and we certainly will be doing everything we possibly can,” Martin said.

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