Thousands of firefighters have secured a lofty pay rise in a sign an industrial umpire is willing to favour workers in fiery labour disputes.
NSW firefighters will receive a 14 per cent wage increase across three years, backdated to February 2024, the Industrial Relations Commission ruled.
That was substantially above the nine per cent offered by the Labor government, which re-established the stand-alone commission in July 2024.
"The work of firefighters is currently significantly undervalued, due to historic or intrinsic factors," the commission said.
The Fire Brigade Employees' Union welcomed the decision as vindication firefighters' role extended to non-fire work, including search-and-rescue operations and road crash scenes.
It had sought 17 per cent, claiming the state's almost 7000 firefighters "had suffered wage suppression for a decade" under the previous coalition government.
The deal includes a one-off bump of two per cent to account for cost-of-living pressures.
Another one-off bump of three per cent recognises their competency in road crash rescue work, which the commission found was a "core function".
Industrial relations expert Fiona MacDonald hoped the finding would discourage state governments from "crying poor when it comes to ... pay increases for public sector workers".
"If state governments genuinely consider pay claims, then unions won't need to go to the (commission)," the acting director of the Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work told AAP.
But other analysts were not sure governments would change their tune about stretched finances or that unions could pencil in other wins.
"There is always a lottery element to any (commission) hearing," University of Sydney professor John Buchanan said.
"Employers have argued that 'capacity to pay' is a key principle they believe should shape wage determination ... so I anticipate the NSW government, no matter what colour, will continue to use this argument."
He said unions would persist with collective bargaining and fall back on arbitration if that failed to deliver.
Doctors, nurses and psychiatrists, who are all agitating for markedly higher pay from the government, are currently engaged in arbitration at the commission.
Their respective unions have gone on strikes before, with psychiatrists threatening a mass exodus.
Prof Buchanan said the 2.5 per cent wages cap by the previous coalition government created deep distortions in the labour market.
One of the architects of that cap, shadow treasurer Damien Tudehope, criticised Labor for surrendering control of its budget.
The commission had "exercised its unshackled power" by rejecting the government's fiscal arguments, the opposition industrial relations spokesman said.
Labor welcomed the commission's decision as delivering wage certainty for firefighters and recognising the work they did at road crash rescues.
"We were elected on a mandate to fix the recruitment and retention crisis in essential services and that is what we are doing," Industrial Relations Minister Sophie Cotsis said.
