Hundreds of thousands of workers on strike across Republic of Ireland

ByAdam Mandeville BBC News NI. 14 October 2026, 06: 27 BST.

Key points

• More than 300, 000 workers, including nurses, doctors, teachers and civil servants, are on strike throughout the Republic of Ireland.
• Dawn Hutchings-Walsh is a teacher at Hartstown Community School in Dublin, and commutes from County Wicklow every day.
• At the end of September, more than 100, 000 workers, including nurses, school staff and civil servants, moved to work-to-rule measures.
• Linda Kelly is the general secretary of the Association of Secondary Teachers Ireland (ASTI) remarked teachers are "really struggling in terms of their pay".
• It comes against the backdrop of an ongoing pay dispute between public sector workers and the Irish administration, with a further strike planned on 21 October.

It is projected schools could be closed with hospital appointments cancelled and picket lines formed nationwide during the 24-hour strike.

At the start of October, primary and secondary school teachers in the Republic began work-to-rule action.

Previously almost 97% of Fórsa members. This person voted in an industrial ballot, did so in favour of action. It is the Republic's biggest public service union.

Brendan O'Brien divisional organiser of SIPTU. It represents public sector health and administration workers, previously remarked the "goodwill" of workers was a substantial part of what kept public services going.

Nevertheless, he stated the Irish government's failure to establish a basis for formal discussions "left our members with no alternative but to act collectively".

On Tuesday Jack Chambers, the Republic's minister for expenditure, described the strike action as "deeply disappointing" saying it would cause significant disruption to the economy, with thousands of hospital appointments set to be cancelled and schools closed.

Speaking to Irish broadcaster RTÉ she remarked the "pay just isn't stretching the way that it used to".

Her colleague Sinéad McCarthy remarked she had to take a career break and move to Dubai for a couple of years to save capital for a deposit.

"It's just not feasible in Ireland to be able to save for a house considering the circumstances and the money that we are on here in this country, " she remarked.

They don't feel like the administration is taking them seriously, there's a lot of disappointment with the laissez-faire approach from administration over the last couple of months.

"There's been ample time to solve this issue and the government has sat on its hands and this is the result now, " Kelly informed RTÉ.

For now, hundreds of thousands of workers on strike across Republic of Ireland remains the part of the story worth watching, and further updates are likely as more details are confirmed.