Joan Collins TD  -  Support Nurses & Midwives
Channel: Joan Collins
Date: 2019-01-17

Support Nurses & Midwives

I wish to put on record my full support for Nurses and Midwives, who I am absolutely sure do not have a light-minded attitude to the effects their actions will have on patient care and the ongoing crisis in our health service. This is reflected in the fact that this is only the second time in 100 years that nurses have voted to take industrial action.

I categorically reject the Taoiseach's recent statements that strike action by nurses will cut across spurious and so-called improvements in the numbers on trolleys in emergency departments and on waiting lists. This is yet another attempt to blame overworked, hard-pressed staff for a crisis that stems from - and I address this comment to Fianna Fáil - decades of underfunding, cutbacks, loss of staff and beds and mismanagement on a gigantic scale. 

This action is not just about pay, it is also about the extremely poor working conditions faced by nursing staff as a consequence of the recruitment and retention crisis in our health service. 95% of nurses voted for strike action. The Government cannot ignore this. These strikes will go ahead. At some point the Government must change its stance and enter meaningful negotiations. As has been said, negotiations started yesterday.

I find it quite repulsive to listen to some of the debate on the airwaves and in the media. Fine Gael Deputies who have accepted a €7,358 increase since 1 January 2017 under the restoration of pay and the unwinding of the financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, and general secretaries of unions who received the same sort of increase can come out and attack nurses for taking this action after going through all the industrial relations processes they could possibly go through. This is the last action workers can take if they know they are not being listened to. This Private Member's motion will be passed and rather than simply ignore it as just another lost vote, it should take seriously the views of the majority in this House and of the public and patients and act accordingly and resolve the situation.