The Labour Court will decide later if it can intervene in the ongoing pay dispute between nurses and the government.
Talks aimed at averting industrial action ended just after 3 o’clock this morning, following 15 hours of negotiations.
They arrived for talks at 12.30pm yesterday, and emerged at 3am this morning.
The Labour court will now decide if there’s common ground between both sides for it to intervene.
Nurses want a 12 per cent pay rise but the government says that isn’t feasible and would cost an extra €300 million a year.
Three days of strikes by members of the INMO and PNA unions are due to begin tomorrow, which could create chaos in the health service.
Either way a decision on whether the strikes will go ahead will be known later.