HEALTH workers have brought their pay protest to the front door of the Northern Ireland Office headquarters in Belfast.

Unison representatives, with one dressed as the Grinch, delivered Christmas cards from health staff and their families addressed to Britain’s Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris at Erskine House.

Public-sector workers in the region are involved in a long-running pay dispute.

Mr Heaton-Harris outlined the details of a £2.5 billion financial package to Northern Ireland’s political leaders on Monday as part of an attempt to stabilise the region’s finances and encourage a return of power-sharing institutions.

The package includes a lump sum to settle public-sector pay claims but requires the return of the Stormont executive, which ceased operations 22 months ago when the Democratic Unionist Party  pulled out of the power-sharing government.

Unison health convener Stephanie Greenwood said thousands of working families are facing Christmas without an increase in pay.

She said: “In effect we are grappling with a pay cut during a year when inflation reached 11 per cent.

“The cost-of-living crisis has hit health staff hard. We got no help from the politician now in charge of Northern Ireland. Instead, he introduced a draconian budget and stood back as the Treasury withheld Barnett consequential funding which could have gone to support workers.”

“Working families are fed up, but we will not be going away,” Ms Greenwood said. “We intend to be on the picket lines with thousands of public-sector workers on January 18.”

Northern Ireland’s party leaders have also criticised Mr Heaton-Harris’s package for not containing enough money.

Sinn Fein has said today should be a cut-off point for talks with the British government, while the DUP has insisted that there is some way to go both in talks on public finances and on discussions to reach a deal on post-Brexit trade arrangements.