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The Queensland nurses union has issued the state government an ultimatum for a pay deal, threatening to authorise strike action as soon as this week.

The state government and Queensland Nurses and Midwives’ Union have been locked in negotiations since January.

The state government has offered an 8% pay rise over three years. The union has announced its demands of 13%, also over three years.

The QNMU secretary, Sarah Beaman, said Queensland’s health minister, Timothy Nicholls, had until Tuesday to agree to the union’s terms or they would escalate to stage two protected industrial action, effectively strike action, the following week.

“We thought we had made progress in defending the most serious attacks on members’ existing rights and conditions, but last Thursday it all fell apart,” she said.

“On the final day of talks, the government pulled the rug out from under us. They told us everything we thought was agreed was suddenly off the table.”

Beaman said union members are “furious”, claiming the government had continue to shift its position.

“That’s why Queenland Health’s 55,000 frontline nurses and midwives have formally put health minister Tim Nicholls on notice. The gaslighting stops here. A letter outlining our demands and a deadline of Wednesday July 2 has been delivered,” she said.

Strike action would begin in the week of 7 July, she said.

Nurses have not walked off the job since 2002. They voted to take protected industrial action earlier in June.

“This is a government who knows the cost of everything but the value of nothing. The government needs to do better by putting forward a better EB12 offer,” Beaman said.

“It is also clear the state budget does not allocate adequate funding to deliver the nation-leading wages and conditions Queensland deserves – and was promised”.