Government officials and the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO) return to the Labour Court this morning to try and resolve the nurses' dispute.
A formal hearing will take place, with the court likely to take several days to come back with a decision.
The dispute revolves around recruitment and retention issues.
Last month, the Labour issued a recommendation aimed at ending strike action.
Several strike days by nurses and midwives earlier this year resulted in major disruption in hospitals.
It led to the cancellation of thousands of surgeries and procedures.
Three further planned strike days were suspended in the wake of the court's recommendations.
However, nursing unions are now unhappy with the productivity reforms in the planned new nursing contract - calling the proposals "onerous" and "unreasonable".
Just delivered: our arguments to the Labour Court on why the government's draft contract is unacceptable to Ireland's nurses and midwives.
Key outstanding issues:
🕓 working hours/rosters
🏥 location changes
Labour Court hearing is on Tuesday. We'll keep members updated. pic.twitter.com/cDODr65LVb— Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation (@INMO_IRL) March 15, 2019
'Very large gap'
The Executive Council of the INMO had previously recommended acceptance of the deal.
Balloting by the union had been due to start last week.
However, the council decided to postpone the start of balloting by two weeks as a result of the stalled negotiations.
They said this is in line with their previous decision that members "would not be balloted without a satisfactory contract".
After contract talks with the Government collapsed earlier this month, the union said a "very large gap" remained between the two sides.
Over 40,000 nurses from the INMO and the Psychiatric Nurses Association (PNA) were due to strike when three planned strike days were suspended last month.
