So pete if the guy next to you in work works a 35 hour week while you work a 40 hour week , he gets paid 30K and you get 27 you wouldnt ask for a rise and/or a reduction in hours ????
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Be careful - they'll get you a job on shocking pay and slave like hours if your not careful :D :DQuote:
Sure I attend to the other patients in the room far more than any of the staff
Apologies but I got a bit confused with the posts below but in your example 27k is the nurse & 30k is ???
Have you not heard the parable of the Prodigal son? :)
I would realise that threatening to strike unless I get 20% (all or nothing) would have little chance of progression. Even if the 20% claim is justified the nurses unions have backed themselves into a corner that any negotiation is a defeat.
I am sure loads of people deserve to be paid more but the fact is the unions signed up to benchmarking & the independent Labour Court said their pay claims should be settled into it. IMO the nurses should sit down to negotiate the reduction in hours which the HSE has offered & pursue the pay increase via benchmarking - it was meant to link pay grades which seems to be the core of the dispute?
They have been asking for a sit down since 1980 but are continually ignored because the goverment know thye wont let down there patients they have been backed into a corner for 27 years and all they ask for fair and equal working conditions .
Here is there list of what there "strike" means they wont be doing .
*Clinical/admin duties; nursing notes will be maintained manually;( admins job )
*Attend meetings, except those involving consideration of named individual patients, their welfare and case management;
*Telephone work, except calls deemed essential on clinical grounds;( admins job )
*Open or secure all community-based buildings and facilities.( securties job )
As you see it doesnt mean an awfull lot if security and admin staff did the jobs they are paid to do there would be no dissrution at all .
Look you started saying that 70 % work 39 hour weeks ive shown you thats wrong
You said nurses start on 31K ive shown you thats wrong
now im not blaming you you went to a official goverment source your only mistake was not realising the figure would be twisted to suit. ( ie the 39 jours just dont add up as my previous post and the 31K doesnt take into mention that they have to work nights and sundays to bump up there pay to 31K )
All they want is to work the same hours as every one else and get the same pay as everyone else ( care assistants recently got a 27% rise !!! )
The list of pay increases gained in during the sham that benchmarking is would seem to contradict this.
If the nurses get 10% pay increase then the teachers will be next in line & so on. The state is already employing too many civil servants (more public sector than private sector jobs created in recent years) so soon will be back to bad days of the 1970s.
I have a good friend who worked in a semi state body for a while & has since left. I now believe that it has poisoned his view of work as he has recently told me story of work demarcation in current private sector job. All this talk of "thanks admins job" reminds me of that antiquated way of thinking. :rolleyes:
For what its worth the nurses seem entitled to discussion on work hours but pay increase in completely invalid as they just linked themselves to other Health service jobs to suit their case. No one has answered why benchmarking (that body is full of civil servants) has disagreed with these claims.
As someone who has closely observed the health service intimately for the past 3 years can I say you are talking ******.
Nursing notes* must be manually recorded, always have and a move to computer based records would cause huge difficulties under Data Protection Act.
* nursing notes would be better described as a two hour doss at start and end of shift. Since when are nursing notes an admin responsibility?
Meetings are normally as part of multi disciplinary team work - who is supposed to know the patient best? The Nurse!
As it stands I am now on my way back to an A&E dept due to an relapse of the person concerned.
No it says they wont do Clinical/admin duties then there is a coma and then it says nurses notes WILL be maintained .
What a doss Id love after 12 hours on my feet to have to stay behind for an extra 2 hours writting up reports , What a life up at 6 30 work 8 to 8 then write reports till 10 ... but after that you have the rest of the day to yourself .
They do know the patients best thats why it says wont attend meetings EXCEPT the meetings concerning patients .
BTW i didnt write those demands they are from the INO website dont see how i can be blamed for talking ****e .
Sorry to hear about the relapse but wouldnt you prefer the nurses to be looking after your friend rather than answering phones , opening buildings , cleaning toilets or sitting in pointless meetings ?
Thats exactly what it amounts to and why my wife left the slave labour behind and now works 9-5 in a health centre with reps bringing them out to dinner almost one day a week. The change in her own health was noticable within a week. I feel for anyone left behind to be bullied, abused and trod on - and that's only by patients and their relatives - I wouldn't even try to picture what the management do to them.Quote:
What a doss Id love after 12 hours on my feet to have to stay behind for an extra 2 hours writting up reports , What a life up at 6 30 work 8 to 8 then write reports till 10 ... but after that you have the rest of the day to yourself .
I read some where it costs 85,000 euro per year ( 4 year course 340,000euro) to train a nurse and in the last few years 9,000 irish nurses have left the country or the proffesion , then the goverment spends million s bringing in 13,000 nurses from outside the country :confused:
at a rough guess thats 3060 million euro wasted on training nurses that leave and i presume importing the 13,000 costs something similar . Wouldnt it just make sence to treat them properly and keep the nurses in the country .
A friend of mine is just about qualified with in the next few weeks but she is all ready planning on getting out of general nursing . After being worked into the ground , attacked by patients and family ( actually punched by a so called man ) she has had enough and she isnt even qualified yet
http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/?...USNCW&rss=rss1
here we go everyone will be at it now & we the tax payers will have to foot the bill. The teachers, guards etc will want what the nurses get.
Examples of people leaving nursing here are examples of personal choices. Some of the talk here makes it sound like nurses work in mineshafts.
If I was employed in the public sector I would also support the nurses as I would realise makes my case for pay increase better. Unfortunately its the private sector workers who will end up with pay increases to fund all these claims.
Interesting that not heard nurse unions requesting more funding of hospital facilities instead of pay rise.
Great Thread Lads.
Out of every €1 spent in the HSE between 70 and 80 cent goes on wages and salaries. The biggest wage expenditure is in the area of nursing.
Is Liam Doran the real CEO of the HSE? So it seems given his propensity to CLAIM the moral high ground on everything.
So a few quick questions for Liam and his supporters
1.How much is ABSENTEEISM amongst nurses costing the HSE (i.e. the taxpayers of this country) every year?
2.For every nurse who is ON DUTY, how many nurses are on full pay but on
sick leave
annual leave
compassionate leave
parental leave
flexible working
course days
study days
concession days
term time
and on it goes.
How many members use/abuse their "entitlement" to the maximum number of uncertified sick days in a year?
3. For every nurse who agrees a contract to work a 24/7 ROSTER, how many actually work night duty?
4. Does the INO / PNA accept that one of the reasons nurse morale is so low is that BULLYING is endemic in the profession i.e. BY NURSES TO NURSES?
5. Does the INO/PNA place any creedance in the views of the World Health Organisation that stress the need for nurses to spend much more of their practice IN THE COMMUNITY at PRIMARY CARE level, rather than in Acute Hospital settings? Accepting this would mean a huge saving to the HSE in reduced overtime payments to nurses for weekend and night duty, but I somehow doubt the nurses would give this up, even 'though 24/7 has become a huge part of many peoples working lives now, many of whom don't get bonus payments for "unsocial" shifts.
I believe the public is in thrall to the nurses, because when those we love are sick we will be grateful for any kindness or support given to us.
Many of you have posted your support for the nurses above and have given instances of where you sat at the bedside of loved ones, so can I ask, if THE SAME NURSE did two consecutive shifts while you were there? My point is there is NO CONTINUITY of care for those who are sick in hospital.
It's very fashionable to bash the religious orders in this country now, but from my recollection, when the nuns were in charge of hospitals, they were clean and infection free. Now under a nurse manager structure infection is rampant and from my observations nurses come and go off the wards as they please in uniform.
I recently sat at a relatives bedside, close to the nurses station. The "quality" of care was very poor. Lots of flicking through magazines, arranging the next night out, recommending shopping spots and commenting on patients relatives, but only very rare visits to the patients bedside.
Since their last industrial action and the Commission on Nursing, they are very quick to brandish their professional credentials, but not so quick to honour their responsibilities IMO.
Most of this post is unashamedly against the nurses arguments in this dispute. In the interests of balance, I want to state I have been lucky enough to come across some brilliant professionals who have given excellent care and go beyond and above the call of duty. They deserve any concessions Liam Doran and Des Kavanagh get for them. My problem is a huge number of lazy opportunists will also benefit from the nursing gravy train which looks set to run and run.
Maybe that’s true of all “professions”?
Good post My Town, the govt has ruined the health system and don't know how to fix it. As mentioned some time last week all the above topics are indeed rife in the nursing system here, until the training and management are tightened up there will continue to be people who abuse it as you rightly state. It is also a reason why the good nurses are leaving as I stated earlier in this thread. This current strike in the eyes of most honest nurses is just the straw that broke the camels back. As I stated before my missus wouldn't have had any probs with the money or hours.
Not even close, the mineshafts were mild in comparisson at times. You don't have to accept it, I'm giving my wife's experiences, she left before she was beaten or bullied out of it like many before her. No word of a lie, no exaggeration. She used come home from work and pass out, physically sick most of the time. I accept she was one of the "honest" ones, cut out for the vocation from the age of 12, but it's not acceptable. In England where she nursed it was a treat in the much maligned NHS.Quote:
Examples of people leaving nursing here are examples of personal choices. Some of the talk here makes it sound like nurses work in mineshafts.
Exactly sadly.
I meant to put a smilie thingy by the mineshift thing as well obviously as it's not that bad. There are too many issues, assaults/threats, management issues, staffing levels, colleagues who are shocking and should not be left dress themselves let alone a wound, colleagues who are fed up to the back teeth with the treatment so don't care/don't show up and at the very end in my opinion they would all like less hours and more money (shure wouldn't we all). As I say this strike has continued cos they are at such a low ebb.
One simple anecdote from my wifes experiences was that they were not allowed bring in their own lunch or even a bottle of water to take on refreshment when melting from the heat in a ward. So if she didn't eat what was on offer in the disgusting canteen, it was tough luck. I do not jest. That's what it boiled down to, no toilet breaks sometimes in a 12 hour shift, 1 person looking after a 25 patient ward on nights - happened my missus twice. Who would have been blamed if something went wrong? She went through the complaints procedure and is still awaiting an answer 16 months later, all she got was abused for being so "outspoken", the cheek of her.
I'm sorry but that sort of deification helps nobody. its a job. its a well paid job. its a rewarding job. its a sociable job. they are no more "devoting their lives to help sick people" than a pharmacist or your local copper. if people want to be treated like charity cases, start acting like it.
Well that's your take on it, thanks for that. Still doesn't entitle people to treat them so badly. Cop's don't deserve to be treated like that either - they are and they are devoted to saving peoples lives as well in my book. Credit where credit is due.
You put it in the same catagory as someone selling pills, I don't to be honest, but there ya go.
No deification needed, just a small bit of response would suffice I'd imagine.
Breaking News
Was reported on RTE news tonight that nurses unions rejected a 35 hour working week as not given a start date.
How do they think the HSE can remove 10% of the worked nursing hours from the system overnight? :rolleyes:
I think they should take that offer & sell it as a victory as they won't get a better one. How long before someone dies during work stoppage? If patient care not affected by reduced nurse numbers maybe they not needed so much anyway? :confused:
Did they ask for the start date to be tomorrow? :rolleyes: They're looking for a start date for the implementation, I've never heard them say they want it immediatly. Do you really expect them to take a wishy washy promise from Harney/ HSE at face value? They've one of those that goes back 27 years already. They are right to insist on a laid out time frame, as Harney and co don't know the meaning of good faith.
FF/PDs may not be in government so is it correct that they negotiate a deal the a new government would be stuck with? For arguments sake FF/Pds could agree to 10% reduction in hours & 10% increase in pay. When a potential new government come in they have a queue of public sector unions queuing up for similar increases as the economy slows down...
Do nurses get 1 hour off every month to cash their pay cheque like the rest of the Dept of Health? Heard this first hand a few years ago that this was still given to staff despite everyone using direct debit.
How many new nurses would be needed to be employed to retain existing hours?
From eircom.net
No 1: Is this threat not bullying of the highest order?Quote:
Ms Harney also addressed the conference and said she hoped the protracted dispute between the Health Service Executive (HSE) and nursing unions the INO and Psychiatric Nurses' Association (PNA) would not get worse.
She also urged them to use the Government's National Implementation Body (NIB) and the benchmarking process to pursue their claim for a 10.6 per cent pay rise and the introduction of a 35-hour working week.
In a sometimes hostile atmosphere, Ms Harney was heckled and received no applause after the speech.
The nurses have been continuing a work-to-rule and have staged a series of work stoppages. Tomorrow, three-hour work stoppages will be staged at eight hospitals in Dublin, Cork, Galway and Sligo.
The HSE has given nurses until 5.30pm today to call off their work-to-rule or face a 13 per cent pay-cut.
The INO is holding a private session until 3pm when other politicians will address the meeting in Jury's hotel Ballsbridge. Speakers include Enda Kenny, Liz McManus, Caoimhghin O'Caolain, Joe Higgins, John Gormley and a representative from Fianna Fail.
No 2: So it's ok for them to play around with pay out of benchmarking, but not the other way round?
Good grief, they just don't get it do they? :mad:
Its comical the HSE feigning concern for the patients when it has been their mismanagement in conjunction with government policy that has lead to the sorry state of the health service.
I don't know the details but apparently the Nurses Unions signed a deal some time ago whereby they got a pay rise in exchange for agreeing to deal with all pay disputes through the benchmarking process.
Assuming this is true then the current dispute is in clear breach hence the threat of pay cut?
All that leads to is "If the nurses get X, we want Y" - as already seen in this dispute, by na gardai. Union leaders are elected and if thats who the young women voted for, they can't then go on to claim oh, well, we didnt really mean it when we signed this agreement.
Don't know about the Nurses union in particular but in most cases Union General secretaries and other high officials are not elected. They are glorified bureaucrats who apply for the job the same way you and me applied for our jobs. Very hard to change this due to the undemocratic nature of many unions but needs to be done nonetheless.
As for your other point, so what? Workers in general have suffered under Partnership as their share of the national wealth substantially decreased. We did far better under FCB. Yet at the same time the country wasn't enveloped in Anarchy when we had FCB.
I don't like unions but no point dwelling.
I also believe Benchmarking was a scam that the public sector unions got away with just as the Celtic bubble popped in 2001-02 (i think).
However based on the fact the state has entered into a contract with the public sector unions on the benchmarking we stuck with it for now. It seems the nurses previously signed a contract accepting benchmarking as the wage dispute mechanism, they accepted a significant pay rise for this.
The Labour court previously ruled on this & agreed that the nurses have to negotiate within benchmarking. If the nurses want out of benchmarking then fair enough but they should give back their pay rise & start separate negotiations outside that process.
The massive downside of benchmarking is that if one sector gets a pay rise then everyone else is queuing up & government current account expenditure rises by billions.